Triple Eight locks in enduro pairings

New full-time driver Will Brown will share the #87 Chevrolet Camaro with Triple Eight Race Engineering returnee Scott Pye, meaning there will be no breaking up of the 2023 Sandown 500-winning duo of Broc Feeney and Team Principal Jamie Whincup in the #88 entry.

Pye’s call-up had been announced last October, albeit without the South Australian being confirmed for any particular car at the time.

Then, too, there had been the prospect that three-time Bathurst 1000 winner Shane van Gisbergen might come back to Australia for the 2024 enduros, before Trackhouse Racing announced his 40-race NASCAR programme in December.

Van Gisbergen and Richie Stanaway prevailed in last year’s Great Race in what had been the #97 Triple Eight entry, by which time the latter half of that duo had already signed a deal to return to full-time competition with Grove Racing.

The Feeney/Whincup triumph in last year’s Sandown 500 was the youngster’s first and the veteran’s sixth.

They would likely have finished second to van Gisbergen/Stanaway in the Bathurst 1000 if not for a heartbreaking gear tower failure.

Brown is yet to stand on the Great Race podium but qualified on pole position for last year’s Sandown 500, while Pye is twice a runner-up in Supercars’ Mount Panorama enduro.

Triple Eight is again set to field a wildcard in at least the Bathurst 1000, with Craig Lowndes now signed up through 2025 and the programme’s major sponsor, Supercheap Auto, having also renewed with the squad.

Having driven with Declan Fraser in 2022 and Zane Goddard in 2023, Lowndes is expected to share the #888 Camaro with Eggleston Motorsport Super2 pilot Cooper Murray this time around.

The Sandown 500 takes place on October 20-22 and the Bathurst 1000 on October 10-13.

Triple Eight revealed its new Red Bull Ampol Racing paintwork with a ‘Livery Landing’ this afternoon at Toowoomba Wellcamp Airport, in Brown’s home town.