The 25-year-old was prised away from Erebus Motorsport when Triple Eight Race Engineering was scrambling for a replacement for NASCAR-bound three-time Supercars champion.

At the time of the signing, Brown had only just relinquished the championship lead to then-team-mate Brodie Kostecki, and had four race wins for the year to date.

Come season’s end, he still had four race wins, but had slipped to fifth in a championship battle wrapped up by Kostecki with a race to spare.

Van Gisbergen himself said that he would have preferred his Bathurst 1000-winning co-driver, Richie Stanaway, have been given his seat at Triple Eight while Peter Adderton, a personal sponsor of Stanaway’s, declared overlooking the New Zealander “a huge mistake.”

Now, though, Brown has won two of the first six races of 2024 and his worst result is a second place on the other four occasions.

Asked by Speedcafe about a feeling of proving people wrong, he said, “I knew what I did last year and won four races with Erebus, and I knew moving across to Triple Eight would give me a really good opportunity.

“I’m quite confident with what I could do in the car and I knew, with the move across, I’d be able to win races and hopefully try and win a championship.

“So, yeah, it’s cool to prove a few of them wrong but, you know, I think that was just more people with their own personal opinions of trying to help out people.

“You know, Adderton obviously loves Stanaway and I can understand why he said that – Stanaway was already in the team – but, to be honest, that sort of stuff doesn’t really bother me.

“You hop in the car, you go racing, and it sort of goes from there.”

Brown’s lowlights in the latter half of 2023 included an altogether tough weekend at The Bend, a late off at Sandown which cost him a podium after qualifying on pole for the 500, and a qualifying crash at Bathurst, although he did also undergo surgery the day after the Great Race having battled back pain all year.

Despite his self-confidence, he admitted even he did not expect such a good start to his tenure at Triple Eight.

“I guess this is how I really wanted to start the year, with a good solid start,” said Brown.

“It’s been a really strong start to the year and probably better than I could have expected.

“It’s a tough one joining a new team – you don’t know what they are like – and I knew joining Triple Eight, it’d be an awesome opportunity.

“I think it’s, for them, [a case of] understanding how I race and how to deal with me, so it’s been a great start.”

Brown leads the championship by 17 points over team-mate Broc Feeney.