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Triple Eight Race Engineering has confirmed the signing of Will Brown and the release of Shane van Gisbergen from his contract with the team.
Brown will drive for Red Bull Ampol Racing under a three-year contract beginning in 2024 after his own release from the final year of his deal with Erebus Motorsport.
Van Gisbergen signed a new, two-year deal with Triple Eight in April this year, with a get-out clause for 2025, but will leave at the end of the current Supercars campaign after winning on his NASCAR Cup Series debut in early-July.
Today’s press release from Banyo makes no reference directly to NASCAR, although it does read, in part, “The announcement comes as the team has agreed to allow Shane ‘SVG’ van Gisbergen to explore his dreams to race in overseas categories in 2024 and beyond.”
Triple Eight Team Principal Jamie Whincup is enthusiastic about the respective futures of both its incoming and outgoing drivers.
“As we’ve made clear from the very start, Triple Eight wholeheartedly supports SVG’s decision to showcase his world class talent abroad and we look forward to watching him continue to tear up the track like we witnessed in Chicago last month,” said the seven-time Supercars drivers’ champion.
“Will has been on our radar for many years since he was driving an ex-Triple Eight car in the Super2 championship.
“He is exciting to watch on track, very personable and most importantly, a really good fit to our Triple Eight culture.
“The fact Broc [Feeney] and him grew up racing together and are friends away from the circuit is a bonus.
“Of course, we still have a fight on our hands to win the Drivers’ and Teams’ Championships this season, and that remains Triple Eight’s immediate focus.”
As Whincup noted, Brown has driven Triple Eight hardware already, namely a Banyo-built VF Commodore with Eggleston Motorsport during his first three years in the Dunlop Super2 Series.
After enduro campaigns with Erebus in 2018 and 2019, he was signed to a multi-year deal which would see him graduate to a Repco Supercars Championship seat of his own from 2021, after another year in Super2 with Erebus-aligned Image Racing.
Brown picked up a maiden Championship race win at Sydney Motorsport Park late in his rookie season, and has added four more this year as he vies for the 2023 title with current team-mate Brodie Kostecki as well as both Triple Eight incumbents.
The 25-year-old’s arrival will make for a quite youthful line-up at Triple Eight, given his future team-mate Feeney will only celebrate his 21st birthday just after this year’s Bathurst 1000.
With his triumph at Hidden Valley in the #34 Truck Assist Camaro, Le Brocq is/had been the only 2023 race winner, and indeed the highest-ranked driver in the championship, thought to not be signed for 2024 already.
As for van Gisbergen’s future, it appears more and more likely that he will remain with Trackhouse Racing when he invariably becomes a regular in NASCAR next year.
He raced for Trackhouse for a second time on the weekend just passed, during which time Triple Eight held off on an announcement of what seemed inevitable out of respect to him.
In the meantime, it revealed the renewal of Supercheap Auto as one of its partners, with the automotive parts retailer already the major backer of its wildcard Camaro Supercar.
The 2023 Supercars season continues this weekend with the OTR SuperSprint at Shell V-Power Motorsport Park.
