Top 10 shootouts reduced for 2011 V8s

Top 10 shootouts will be a lot less common in this year’s V8 Supercars Championship.

The 2011 season, to be known for the first time as the International V8 Supercars Championship, will see just six shoot-outs take place, all at V8’s marquee events – the Clipsal 500 in Adelaide, ITM Hamilton 400, Sucrogen Townsville 400, Supercheap Auto Bathurst 1000, Armor All Gold Coast 600 and the Sydney Telstra 500.

It is a change from the 2010 championship where all 14 events featured a top 10 shoot-out.

As per last year, qualifying will be held for both Saturday and Sunday races each, except Barbagallo Raceway, which will have one qualifying session and three races.

In other operational changes, six Wildcard entries will be permitted into the two traditional V8 Supercars endurance races, subject to V8 Supercars board approval.

In the past two seasons, four Wildcards have been allowed, with three competing in 2009 and just two in 2010.

The expanded Wildcard allocation to six may allow Championship teams to plan to enter extra cars, as well as the Fujitsu V8 Series teams.

In the lead up to the endurance races, teams will be able to place other drivers in their cars at Winton, Darwin, Townsville and Queensland Raceway. This will only be able to take place in Practice 1 and 2 on the Fridays at those meetings.

The recently released operations manual also confirmed the use of the soft tyre in 2011. See below for the official list of how and where the soft/hard tyres will be used this year.

A new rule has also been set in place in regards to overtaking and driver conduct. Now, drivers are not permitted to drive any car unnecessarily slowly, erratically or which is deemed potentially dangerous to other drivers at any time. This rule has been implemented to stop teams from slowing cars on purpose to check for damage – as was seen on the Gold Coast.

For the Fujitsu V8 Series, the 2011 FV8 season will be the final year that the BF Falcon and VZ Commodore will be eligible.