Today’s announcement at Ruapuna Raceway of the dates for the 2026 New Zealand double-header included track laps featuring Ford, Chevrolet and Toyota road cars.
Grove Racing’s Matt Payne and PremiAir Racing’s Richie Stanaway represented the Blue Oval and GM respectively, the latter providing a Corvette due to the unavailability of a Camaro.
Brad Jones Racing’s Jaxon Evans lapped the circuit in a Toyota Supra, giving somewhat of a taste of the future when the three brands go head-to-head.
Evans, who drives the BJR-run SCT Logistics entry, is out-of-contract at the end of the current season but will hope to be part of the landmark Toyota campaign and the NZ events.
“It’s obviously very exciting,” said Evans of the NZ double-header that will take in Taupo on April 10-12 and Ruapuna, near Christchurch, the following April 17-19 weekend.
“Taupo has been a great addition to the championship but to have a double-header now is even more exciting, starting in Taupo and venturing down to the South Island.
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“The Kiwi fans really get behind it and I think with that week in between, maybe not so much for the teams, but for some of the other people that are travelling over from Aus, they’ll be able to experience a bit of New Zealand, which is even more exciting.”
Payne and Stanaway also enthused over the addition of Ruapuna, which the latter said should suit the Gen3 machines.
“It’s fairly low speed which I think makes the racing good for us, they don’t have that aero disturbance, you can follow really closely,” said Stanaway.
“If you’re on a strategy where you have a small tyre advantage, you’ll be able to use it to get past, similar to Taupo actually, the racing has been pretty good there.“
Kiwi Supercars legend Greg Murphy was also on hand and hailed the landmark deal, which evokes memories of previous eras.
Murphy won a two-event NZ sojourn for a dozen V8 Supercars at the end of 1996 that featured Pukekohe and Wellington, which in turn was a throwback to the Nissan Mobil Series.
“To be fair I was unsure we would ever see this happen, it’s a huge commitment by a lot of people to put this together,” he said.
“The community down here in Christchurch, the mayor, his office, events people in New Zealand government, all that kind of stuff.
“For them to all come together to make this happen is a great day.”
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