The carmaker is offering Australian teams unprecedented access to its US technical centre and NASCAR knowhow as part of a forced rejig of its Supercars program.
GM declared a need to change tack following news of Triple Eight’s impending defection to Ford, which will leave it without a current winning force in its ranks.
Team 18, PremiAir Racing, Matt Stone Racing and Erebus Motorsport will be the only Camaro runners next year, with Brad Jones Racing defecting to newcomers Toyota.
GMSV boss Jess Bala confirmed the company is currently finalising plans for a US trip for key team staff following the next round of the championship at Queensland Raceway in mid-August.
That will follow a late-July start date for Jeromy Moore, who will switch from Triple Eight to head up the new collaborative ‘Team Chevy’ offensive, reporting to US-based GM motorsport boss Eric Warren.
“The intention is to get everyone over there, meet more of the team and spend some more time with Eric, who obviously was here in March,” Bala told Speedcafe.
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“We’ll give them access to some of our racing powerhouses, go spend some time with [NASCAR team] Trackhouse, talk about driver development and let them see the resources available.
“It’ll allow them to build some of those contacts as well, and obviously once Jeromy is officially onboard that will be the team he works directly with as well.
“It certainly won’t be the last time we do this but it’s exciting to be able to offer this up to all of the teams and get them over to the headquarters, essentially, of GM Racing.”
GM wants team principals and key engineers from all four teams to attend the engineering-focused trip, while drivers may be included in future initiatives.
The catch is that, while GM will provide the access and connections, teams must pay for their own flights and accommodation.
That has led to suggestions that Team 18, which has gained financial support from GM to take over homologation team duties from Triple Eight, may be the only squad involved.
Bala, however, is adamant teams see the value in investing time and money into the trip, which may also take in a NASCAR event.
“I think we’ve had good buy-in for the trip,” she said.
“Obviously it’s not a short trip to take, it’s quite an investment to go and do that and we’re getting into the pointy end of the season where the duration between the races lessens.
“But I think just showing the teams want to go across and have booked themselves in shows the commitment to that.”
There’s also scepticism about how comprehensive the ‘Team Chevy’ data and setup information sharing plan will be in practice and whether teams will fully embrace the concept.
Bala said Team 18 and Erebus have already begun some dialogue, while PremiAir and MSR won’t be involved until their Triple Eight data agreements expire at year’s end.
While Triple Eight currently works as a mothership for its customers, the new GM plan will have team information feeding into a central source controlled by Moore.
“There’s already been some really good sharing between Team 18 and Erebus,” said Bala.
“Barry [Ryan] and Adrian [Burgess] are in very constant discussions around how they’re applying things to vehicles, changes they’re making and then debriefing afterwards.
“It’s been very much embraced by everyone, which is great, they see the benefit of us moving forward together.”
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