It’s often said the championship needs more conflict on and off track between its combatants to return to its glory days.
Driver rivalries have been at the forefront since Australian touring car racing burst into popular culture in the 1960s.
Think Jane versus Moffat, Brock versus Moffat and Johnson versus Brock.
While those legends endure, it has us debating; What has been the greatest rivalry of the modern Supercars era, which began in 1997?
Below is some food for thought as we await your answer on this week’s Pirtek Poll. Cast your vote at the bottom of the page.
Mark Skaife vs Craig Lowndes
This rivalry took hold amid a fiercely competitive period as teammates at the Holden Racing Team in the late 1990s.
Contrasting personalities and styles between the technically-driven Skaife and flamboyant Lowndes added to an intense dynamic that divided the team in two.
Skaife lost the 1998 and ’99 titles but shrewdly positioned himself for success, getting the upper hand in 2000 after masterminding an engineer switch.
Lowndes’ subsequent shift to Ford promised to elevate the rivalry further, but aside from an early flashpoint in Adelaide, their biggest battles were already run.
Russell Ingall vs Mark Skaife
Russell Ingall swerving at a gesticulating Mark Skaife following a clash at Eastern Creek in 2003 is one of the most iconic scenes in Supercars history.
It was a flashpoint years in the making.
Ingall had terrorised Skaife and the factory HRT outfit while racing Commodores for Larry Perkins, and the rivalry only intensified when he switched to Stone Brothers and Ford.
A mutual dislike was most evident on the V8 Superstars TV panel show, while post-career appearances as Fox Sports hosts added further to the legend.
Mark Skaife vs Marcos Ambrose
It’s a testament to Skaife’s competitive nature that he gets no fewer than three mentions on this list.
Ambrose immediately ruffled feathers when he exploded onto the V8 scene as a fresh-faced Ford hero in 2001, dethroning Holden and Skaife for the title just two years later.
The Stone Brothers star’s first race win came after a bumper-bashing battle with Skaife at Phillip Island in 2002 – the same year they made contact on the opening lap of practice at Oran Park.
Their most famous clash occurred at Wanneroo in 2005, when a bumping duel off the start landed Skaife in the gravel and Ambrose in hot water with officials.
Marcos Ambrose vs Greg Murphy
“These two do not like each other and they are going to have some serious words. They are two heated men, they are two heated competitors.”
Leigh Diffey’s call of Ambrose and Murphy’s face-off at The Cutting following a crash in the closing stages of the 2005 Bathurst 1000 said it all.
That was the standout moment in this rivalry, but far from the only one.
They’d already had some heated words the year before on the Gold Coast, when Murphy took the Tasmanian to task over a brake test on teammate Rick Kelly.
Jamie Whincup vs Mark Winterbottom
This rivalry had its origins in karting, continued through Formula Ford and went all the way to battling over Supercars titles and Bathurst 1000 wins.
The die for their Supercars careers was cast in a sliding doors 2006 silly season that sent Whincup to Triple Eight and Winterbottom to what is now Tickford.
Triple Eight’s switch to Holden in 2010 increased the public attention on their stoushes but did not stop Whincup doing most of the winning.
Winterbottom did, though, manage to chalk up a Bathurst and a title, famously slamming the Peter Brock Trophy down in front of his rival after a last-lap battle in the 2013 Great Race.
Scott McLaughlin vs Shane van Gisbergen
This pair of Kiwis came to Supercars via the Stone Brothers and went on to become V8 champions before finding new careers in the United States.
Along the way, McLaughlin, a boyish heir apparent to Lowndes with tremendous fan appeal, and introverted, hardcore racer van Gisbergen had their fair share of differences on and off track.
SVG proved a thorn in McLaughlin’s side on multiple occasions during 2017, including at the infamous Newcastle finale, but it was the following year’s title battle that proved this rivalry’s zenith.
It included a cracking scrap on home soil at Pukekohe, which van Gisbergen won and promptly proceeded to ‘park-in’ McLaughlin in victory lane. That was an accident, though, of course…
Chaz Mostert vs Cam Waters
The fact this pair are friends and were at one point teammates who simply couldn’t stay away from each other on track makes this a rivalry with a difference.
During their time together at Tickford, Mostert was directly responsible for taking Waters’ car out of contention at the Bathurst 1000 on three consecutive occasions.
Mostert’s move to Walkinshaw may have made for less awkward Tickford debriefs, but it didn’t stop this seemingly magnetised duo from colliding on several more occasions.
It’s been a while since their last clash, and they in fact raced as co-drivers in this year’s Bathurst 12 Hour, but you can never look away when these drivers are arrowing for the same apex.
Broc Feeney vs Ryan Wood
Yes, this may seem like a premature inclusion, given their famous Adelaide Grand Final clash happened less than six months ago.
But Feeney’s reluctance to simply shrug off his displeasure with Wood following the heartbreak of losing the 2025 title stands out in an era of friendships and smiles on social media.
The Triple Eight ace revealed at the 2026 season launch that he’d snubbed a text from Wood in the aftermath of Adelaide and also turned his back on vision of the infamous incident.
While Feeney expressed empathy for Wood in the aftermath of mechanical failure in Christchurch last week, there promises to be plenty of intense battles ahead between this pair of young stars.
Discussion about this post