New Zealand’s burgeoning V8 SuperTourers class is confident of securing a star-studded line-up of co-drivers for its upcoming endurance season, with a host of current V8 Supercar pilots expected to be amongst the action.
The maiden V8 SuperTourers calendar is broken up into four sprint and three endurance rounds, with the third of the single-driver events set to take place at Manfeild this weekend.
The penultimate meeting of the season – the Pukekohe 500 – is being looked upon as the category’s ‘crown jewel’ race, and could see the entire 20 car field with internationally sourced co-drivers.
Series organisers are hoping to attract a mixture of mainly IndyCar and V8 Supercars drivers to the event, which will take place the weekend after V8 Supercars’ own internationally flavoured Armor All Gold Coast 600.
V8 Supercars stars currently being linked to seats in the Pukekohe 500 include Lee Holdsworth, Shane van Gisbergen, Will Davison and David Reynolds, while Fabian Coulthard has already confirmed that he’ll line-up alongside V8 SuperTourers regular Greg Murphy.
According to V8 SuperTourers CEO Paul Radisich, IndyCar drivers including Scott Dixon, Sebastien Bourdais, Tony Kanaan and Ana Beatriz have all expressed interest in competing, with the category looking to start locking in deals following the completion of next month’s Indianapolis 500.
“We are in discussions with a lot of drivers about doing the endurance races,” Radisich told Speedcafe.com.
“The big one for us is going to be Pukekohe – that’s going to be our showpiece for the year.
“There are a few of the V8 Supercar drivers like Lee Holdsworth and Shane van Gisbergen that are pretty much 100 percent locked in, but our further internationals like Scott Dixon and Tony Kanaan, most of them are just thinking about Indy at the moment and just want to get that out of the way.
“Everything with those guys (from the United States) is currently expressed interest, and we’re just in the process of going through whether they can have a business seat or if it has to be first class!
“If we can get half a dozen IndyCar guys to come out, and the rest from Australia, it’d be a very good event.”
While the IndyCar pilots are being targeted for the Pukekohe race only, Radisich says he expects several of the V8 Supercars drivers to sign-up for all three endurance races.
The season will end at Powerbuilt Tools Raceway in Christchurch on November 23-25, while the location and exact date of September’s first enduro is expected to be confirmed in the coming days.
