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SpeedSeries

After three seasons, it looks like SpeedSeries will be no more going into 2025 with a like-for-like replacement national racing series being helmed by SRO’s Australia division. So that means Motorsport Australia won’t be in charge going forward after only one season when they previously controlled SpeedSeries from the Australian Racing Group, although they will continue to contribute this in some way like it was last season.

As it stands, GT World Challenge (GT3) will come right in first with the GT4 Australia and the Australian Production Cars race categories next in-line, as seen with the stand-alone GT Festival event last month at Phillip Island. 

What does it mean for TCR Australia and Trans-Am? Safe to say that they’re both not going anywhere. For Trans-Am, they might join the Supercars support bill for the most part while TCR Australia may be looking to form an Asia-Pacific competition with TCR’s Asia series. 

But that doesn’t mean both TCR & Trans-Am are going to be left out of SpeedSeries’s replacement competition altogether as they may still play a role with SRO in some events.

Don’t forget also the TCR World Tour will be back in Australia after all next year after a year-long absence, but they won’t be racing at Mount Panorama again for sure when the annual Bathurst International event will wrap up for the last time this November.

Plus, one thing we know for sure that the S5000 open-wheel category won’t be back at least for the foreseeable future when that race series was shut down at the end of last season.

Looking at the race calendar (not final just yet), what’s new about this SpeedSeries replacement comp is they’ll be heading over to New Zealand for the first time at Hampton Downs that will round out the series late next year. Other than that, there’s nothing much apart from the usual six-round event that will take place a few times throughout the year likewise with other racing series across the country. 

And last but not least, the media rights deal. The question is who will be covering SRO Australia’s newly expanded competition? Right now, SpeedSeries is currently on 7 under Motorsport Australia’s control until the end of this season before SRO Australia will be taking over from Motorsport Australia next year.

Whatever that may be, let’s hope they can keep it free-to-air at all times.

For now, we wish SRO Australia the best of luck by taking the step up to make their sports cars roar against the likes of the current Supercars comp we’ve got here.

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Yes, SpeedSeries so far this year may have been completely different compared to 2022-23, especially at a time during the mixed paid/free TV experiment on Stan and Nine (via 9Gem and 9Go) before Motorsport Australia took back the rights at season’s end for the competition to return on Seven once again. 

But that doesn’t mean SpeedSeries can be completely forgotten when times have changed since then as fortunate to catch up with one of the drivers competing there via the competition’s series of race categories in Trans-Am Australia. 

His name is Jackson Rice who currently races the No.7 Ford Mustang for Dream Racing & hails from Albury-Wodonga – right in between the NSW-Victoria border.

This interview is available both in written and video/audio form below:

SpeedSeries/Trans-Am so far of 2024

1. First of all, it’s great to hear from you as it’s been a long while for me to catch up since the end of last season. How is SpeedSeries going on right now compared to the last 1-2 years?

Really good, I feel like the Seven Network coverage has been fantastic this year with the support of Seven (via 7mate on TV) and the 7 + app. For us personally, it gave us fantastic value to our sponsors & our supporters. It also gave us track time and vision & I think it really boosted our (Trans Am Australia) category that brought really good incentive for other people to join us, especially going into 2025.

2. How much do you miss the International drivers coming here as well as the S5000 open-wheel category?

I think this year’s Bathurst International event is the last year they’ve proposed (with the event not returning next year) & I think the International drivers we have coming here are awesome. They brought a different perspective of class that gave an International and world view of the categories they’ve competed (from Sports cars to World Touring Cars & the likes).

The S5000 open-wheel category are awesome machines & it’s said those guys (the drivers who competed last year) couldn’t have the numbers (on the grid) to compete. But I think all those categories (like the GT World Challenge, GT4 Australia Series & TCR Australia) with the organisers involved are really cool to watch. It’s a shame it’s going to be the last hurrah that they (the S5000 open-wheel organisers) won’t continue with it.

3. Speaking of the journey you’ve had so far this season, what was your 2024 like so far if you can describe it in just a few words?

It’s been positive with a huge learning curve. So yes, it’s been an all-round positive.

4. I looked at your Facebook/social media page lately & there’s a quite a few related to Supercars, how much preparation of you driving these race kind of touring cars or sedans have benefited your Super2 opportunity? 

Massively…I think the Trans-Am is a fantastic category that opens doors to a lot of avenues including working towards Supercars & those high-end performance categories. 

So Trans-Am where it’s at right now has fantastic value with some of the guys in there who are true professionals that previously raced in V8 Supercars before through co-driving (at Endurance Races like the Bathurst 1000) or full-time.

Guys like myself – who are young and trying to make a name for our ourselves – I think that mix (of both youth and experience) presents really well for those who are scouting for talent including Super2 (Supercars main feeder category), and it’s been a massive help for me to step  from a Trans-Am into a Super2 by driving a high-powered rear wheel drive race car.

5. Looking at the present when it comes to Trans-Am, what would be the No.1 thing you wished you could’ve done any better & how you will apply this to your next set of Trans-Am races later this year in November?

I think the biggest thing we like to improve on is finishing our races. 

We have very consistent pace with the guys at Dream Racing giving me a consistent race car but we’ve been really unfortunate to have some mechanical failures which sort of put us a bit on a damper with our season’s race results. 

But we had a couple of podiums where we’ve been consistently inside the Top 8 or 6 before we were able to finish consistently to then drag more podiums at the end of the race and not having a DNF towards the end of the 2024 season would probably make a big difference for us.

6. Other than Trans-Am wait until November, do you have any other races you got lined up like the TA2 Muscle Car Series you’ve competed in the past?

I’m planning to, I like to race some more other than the usual Trans-Am. We’ve been fortunate with our sponsors and budget this year, so I won’t definitely rule it out to come back and compete in the TA2 events to keep me busy & in the seat for the next round at Bathurst in Trans-Am.

Being present at Sandown Raceway while talking a couple of other race tracks across Australia

Other than his ongoing Trans-Am season, there’s more to life from Jackson who is currently helping out at Sandown Raceway this weekend where we will pick it up from here.

1. Great to hear you’re in Sandown for the weekend, I was wondering if it was an different event you’re competing there?

I’m just down here with a couple of guys who are new drivers that come in to the team we compete for racing such as meeting them before they compete on the new Toyota 86 races. But I’m business where I don’t have to drive which is alright.

2. How’s the atmosphere like at Sandown Raceway?

It’s fantastic! I love coming to the Victorian VMRC (Victorian Motor Racing Championships). They have good grassroots & state-level racing with a great variety of categories & it’s really good being involved & see grassroots racing. To come back especially post-COVID, the atmosphere’s really good.

Pause

Link of the weekend’s events LIVE and on-demand on BlendLine TV’s YouTube Channel here.

3. Speaking of Sandown, I hear they are going to knock the place down while looking to build a new race track next to Avalon Airport. I was wondering if this was true?

I’m unsure at the moment. I know there were proposed plans (of Sandown being knocked down for housing) but unsure if it’s going ahead. But Sandown is such an iconic venue that in the end, there was so much support behind it to keep it now that I think it will be pretty harsh to get rid of.

4. I heard there’s a different SpeedSeries category event going on at Phillip Island within Victoria in the GT World Challenge as wondering if they’re hosting this alone or a part of the main event support bill?

Yeah, I believe it’s a standalone event with the GT Festival with just GT3, GT4 and other Production Car categories.

Pause

Link to watch the GT Festival weekend race at Phillip Island also on GT World’s YouTube channel here.

5. With Wakefield Park over in Goulburn, they were also being under threat at one stage due to the noise but now they still get to keep the track?  

It’s interesting that they’ve come back and made provisional changes to keep the noise down. I think they’ll definitely come back to run events with no issue. With the noise restrictions, I think they’re going to run less events and it will just be selected to certain race cars to make sure that they don’t break that noise barrier they’ve set.

His best moment of racing and even the Olympics also in 2024

And other than racing cars, what’s your favourite moment of 2024 so far across motorsport and even the Olympics when our Aussie team had their best campaign recently at Paris? I’m also wondering which Olympic sport you’d be best competing in if it was for gold?

I think our podium at The Bend Motorsports Park (South Australian Round between May 31-June 2) was a great achievement for us & the team. We had real pace we showed that we competed with the big teams like GRM (Garry Rogers Motorsport), TFH & The Racing Academy.

So that’s been a fantastic sort of point for me personally.

Then you know throughout the Olympics, the Australians really had our best campaign at Paris 2024. So it’s really cool to be Aussie and to be pretty proud when your country does well.

And for myself if I was to compete in a sport, that’s a hard one, I enjoy doing water sports so maybe I’ll probably go with Rowing since being by the water was pretty cool. I think the guys have endurance who use a lot of upper body & core strength which a lot of stuff really translates to racing cars, so something similar I reckon I would give it a crack.

Post-Notes

We wish Jackson all the best of luck as he will be back for the back-to-back November Trans-Am Australia races at Bathurst and Adelaide. He is so someone who loves watching NASCAR, especially on a Monday morning with the Cup races.

As said, if you want to keep a good eye on his driving progress – Seven & 7 + is the place to be for everything SpeedSeries.

You can also follow him and his Dream Racing team across social media:

And yes, He sure gave a wonderful shoutout also to none other than our Aussie own Leigh Diffey, who is set make his full-time commentary debut in the NASCAR Cup Series for the US NBC network, starting with the Coke Zero Sugar 400 race at Daytona tomorrow morning our time at 9.30am AEST. You can tune in live on Fox Sports via Foxtel/Kayo Sports back here who has the live local NASCAR TV rights.

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Yes, we all know Chris Stubbs is back on Stan Sport at Nine’s Sydney studios alongside Wally Masur and Casey Dellaqua with the next grand slam already underway for nearly a week now over at the Roland Garros in Paris, France. That isn’t going anywhere with Wimbledon coming up in a few week’s time (maybe on-site again like it was last year) since he’s freelance having also done a bit for Network 10 a few months ago at the Formula 1 Australian Grand Prix. Not only that he will be on Stan more often instead of being at Queensland Raceway twice (one in mid-July and another in early August) when the next Summer Olympics will arrive also from the same place come late July to early August. So for SpeedSeries and Australian motorsport fans, they won’t see him for a long while until the penultimate round on the 18-20th October at Sydney Motorsports Park not long before the season usually wraps up at Mount Panorama in Bathurst on the 8th-10th November. He will also be at the next Bathurst 1000 in early October as always to provide the big event action for 7 like he does every year.

I know SpeedSeries is happening right now going into tomorrow at The Bend Motorsports Park in South Australia but it seems they chose to things a bit differently by having a host/commentary team calling from a studio being supplied by SEN while still having a small on-site presence of just a handful of staff and 1-2 pit reporters. As said when Stubbsy is unavailable, just didn’t see that coming when The Bend just came back into life for the first time since 2019 & it would be great if they sent a full group of staff there to celebrate after a difficult last few years on top of COVID. However, I can understand given the shortage of staff and long distance from here – despite the fact that Matt Naulty and Richard Craill are SA based but both had to come over to Melbourne to do the job rather than from the race track. Don’t forget the series has found its progress back on free-to-air/free-to-view all over it following the mixed free and paid content experiment throughout the last two years with most via subscription on Stan and some on Nine when SpeedSeries was really struggling to attract sponsorship back then.

All in all, it’s a tough decision but glad SpeedSeries is experimenting all options in order to keep its free-to-air exposure growing so everyone who is interested can see it – even though doing 1-2 events remotely might be the norm these days like we see with other sports and also other networks given the costs to cover the production side of things & on-air staff as well.

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The 2024 Bathurst 6 Hour race will be aired on SBS (yes, on the main channel) during the Easter long weekend since this event has been run and sold separately by Australian Racing Group & not Motorsport Australia who looks after SpeedSeries. The last two Bathurst 6 Hour editions in 2022-23 was covered by Nine and Stan Sport where there was a bit of free-to-air access with the following week race highlights as well as live qualifying only last year. However, the race itself was only paywalled via Stan Sport before Motorsport Australia took back media rights control off ARG at the end of last season that saw the end of Nine/Stan covering SpeedSeries on what has been an underwhelming paid and free TV experiment, with Seven now back onboard again for all races being live & free throughout the year. It will basically be a full endurance race that runs for a few hours throughout Sunday from 11.30am to 6pm with qualifying on the day beforehand alongside a couple of other production car support categories into play including the Australian Formula Ford open-wheel series. Like SpeedSeries, I’m sure it will be a great event if you want to tune in for motorsport on the TV throughout the Easter weekend.

Speaking of SBS, they are back for another season of the Australian Superbike Championship where Chris Vermeulen will be replacing Kate Peck as the host/reporter while retaining every race highlights of the World Superbike Championship that will air the following weekend after the race (if you wish to watch the live races, it’s on Fox Sports via Foxtel and Kayo Sports) and of course the main Speedweek show too on Sunday afternoons.

Speaking of Bathurst, the Bathurst International may still go ahead later this November to round off the 2024 SpeedSeries season but unfortunately the best of the TCR drivers from around the world won’t be back here including the Sydney Motorsports Park round now being cancelled despite originally planning to do so. It’s a shame but the ongoing shipping delays worldwide has saw the organisers that run the TCR World Tour skip Australia just for this year. There is hope though of having Australia v the best of the World rivalry back again at our own backyard only at Mount Panorama in Bathurst for 2025.

And last but not least, Matt White has a new motorsports media job coming up and he will now be commentating the Supercars races on radio for SEN starting this weekend with the Bathurst 500 season-opening race alongside experienced Supercars driver James Moffatt as the expert/colour commentator. He has been in this business for a long time when he first started his career at Ten back in the early 90s, then moved to Seven between 2004-14, back to Ten for another few years until mid-2020, later appeared on Nine for the first time over the last two years via Stan Sport for SpeedSeries before the competition moved back to Seven & now he’s back behind the mic again this time for radio in Supercars. Don’t forget he’s done a lot of stuff with SEN since he left Ten again like hosting his own daily sports talk show during weekday mornings including rugby league and cricket commentary. So still plenty to offer, especially when he returned to commentary for a short time filling-in for Richard Craill late last year in the Australian Trans-Am Series. We wish him all the best in his new role.

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SpeedSeries has returned for another new season that started today at Sandown Raceway in Victoria where a few categories have came back, while some have came into the fold for the first time on what is going to be a huge year ahead – including the Bathurst 6 Hour during the Easter long weekend, as well as the TCR World Tour drivers coming back again to take on the Aussie field this November at Eastern Creek (Sydney Motorsports Park) & Bathurst (Mount Panorama Circuit) respectively.

But there’s also a change of broadcaster too as Seven has returned replacing Nine & Stan Sport as their broadcast partner for the next two years. Yes, the shift of having most of the stuff behind the paywall including elements of free-to-air content didn’t work out for the majority. Although if they did add the three-hour Sunday races on top of the three-hour Saturday coverage including the Bathurst 6 Hour race, then it wouldn’t be bad. However, it was the change of hands from Australian Racing Group back to Motorsport Australia that led to Nine/Stan leaving the series also after two years when ARG brought them here exactly two years ago. Before that, Seven first broadcasted the competition in 2021 (the 2020 season was cancelled due to COVID) before the split paywall experiment while SBS aired the inaugural TCR Australia season for one year in 2019.

Now most of the broadcast graphics including the leaderboard haven’t changed much except the SpeedSeries logo being moved from the bottom right to the bottom left. Same goes with the broadcast team like Chris Stubbs (he will still be on Stan’s grand slam Tennis coverage throughout the year as he’s freelance), Matt Naulty, Richard Craill & Greg Rust. Although one new face have now come onboard front & centre in Sarah Burt as a few will be moved on. We won’t be seeing ex-Supercars driver Fabian Coulthard & Rally legend Molly Taylor back again. So does Matt White, who not only appeared on Nine for the first time over the last two years as host after he spent so much time between Seven & Ten, but he also returned to commentary for a bit towards the end of last season in the Trans-Am alongside Naulty due to Craill having to focus on the TCR World Tour’s Australian leg with Rust and Paul Jeffrey.

Another thing we won’t have to put up is Nine’s inability on not wanting to use the Wide World of Sports watermark as seen with the SpeedSeries’ free-to-air broadcasts last year where Seven & even Ten and SBS has presented it so nicely when it comes to their motorsports coverage. But I doubt it won’t go away anytime soon since they barely broadcast any racing until Stan Sport was born back in 2021 when Nine will get to air a bit again Live during the 24 Hours of Le Mans in June with parent streaming subsdiary Stan still holding the rights there alongside IndyCar, Formula E, Rallying, Motocross & the World Endurance Championship. So there goes your SpeedSeries broadcast guide this season other than Supercars being on Seven for half the time as well as Fox Sports who holds all of the races including Formula 1, NASCAR & MotoGP & both Australian Grand Prix events will stay on Network 10. And that is that for now as we wish SpeedSeries all the best going forward in growing the competition towards better milestones for Motorsport in Australia.

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So there we have it! SpeedSeries including Trans-Am and TCR Australia will return to the Seven Network next season after two years out at Nine through its paid streaming service Stan Sport as well as some free-to-air on 9Gem/9Go & also 9Now. Every round will be live and free on its free streaming platform 7Plus as well as through 2-3 hour TV windows on 7mate. Plus, there should be free to view on-demand replays, the Bathurst 6 Hour Easter race and mid-week to next weekend TV highlights of each round.

Gotta say that the paid and free content split did not work out when SpeedSeries is not on the same level as Supercars, even if Fox/Kayo did share the series with Seven instead of Nine/Stan who did a great job covering SpeedSeries. It’s just that the change of media rights hands back to Motorsport Australia recently from Australian Racing Group makes it complicated when most of their sanctioned competitions are on Seven.

But having everything free-to-air is massive so every Motorsport fan here can check this out whether it’s watching Live or on-demand at anytime, anywhere throughout the year. It also remains to be seen who will be back next year when it comes to the on-air talent where most of them will be staying on except with just 1-2 changes, which I think Mark Beretta will be back for Matt White since he’s always been on Seven with Motorsport as well as reading sports reports for the Sunrise brekky program for a long time.

Other than the Nine and Stan exit, it looks like the S5000s and Touring Car Masters will be following them out the door as they could end up being a regular part of the Supercars schedule. Although the Australian GT World challenge will look to stay on the SpeedSeries categories list after SRO has taken full control recently alongside the Australian GT4 Series.

For now, you can catch these last two-hour replays from the Bathurst International season finale weekend on 9Go tomorrow at noon, as well as midnight Sunday 12.20am that is followed by an hour highlights from the 6 Hours of Bahrain (also a season finale round) in the FIA World Endurance Championship.

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We didn’t see this coming when there was an update today by V8 Sleuth that Nine and Stan Sport won’t be back covering SpeedSeries next season after two seasons thanks to the recent change of media rights control back to Motorsport Australia, not Australian Racing Group who brokered the deal with Nine/Stan at the beginning of last year.

Yes, Stan will continue to show IndyCar, Formula E, World Endurance Championship, World Rally Championship & Motocross next season as per promos during the Bathurst International weekend, but there’s no SpeedSeries on this list which has the main reason as to why these question marks has been raised. But then it would also be complicated for Motorsport Australia to keep Nine & Stan onboard covering SpeedSeries when the rest of their sanctioned competitions are covered by Seven. We don’t know how the coverage will look like going forward but we expect to see more free-to-air coverage since it will either be on Seven or SBS who both don’t have their own streaming arms, although a paid component will still be the crucial (expecting to be Fox Sports & Kayo) likewise with the Nine/Stan deal in order to keep the $$$ going for all participants involved.

As said, glad SpeedSeries is growing as seen with both TCR Australia & Trans-Am competitions as well as some International flavour with the help from TCR World Tour guys over the last two weeks including the way how the coverage is spread out by having a balance of both free and paid content, which is in a better place now than it was the start of last season. Let’s hope it stays that way going forward while Nine should finally have the WWOS logo on-air if they do air live Motorsport again.

It was also great seeing Matt White covering back Motorsport over the last two years here including his recent return commentating the Trans-Am races with Matt Naulty. He too finally appeared on Nine for the first time during Nine/Stan’s debut coverage with SpeedSeries in February last year after spending half the time out of his three-decade TV career at Seven & Ten. It remains to see where he will end up next after the Nine/Stan exit other than his daily sports radio job. For now, we wish SpeedSeries including its respective categories via its teams and drivers as well as the broadcasting talent the best of luck in the near future!!

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First of all, I’m glad that SpeedSeries –  which showcases a range of categories from TCR Australia to Trans-Am & S5000 single seaters – has improved their free to air coverage this year with every race live throughout the season during Saturday afternoons. That way, if you like how the coverage and racing is like, then you can watch the rest of the weekend’s events including a full suite on-demand content only via subscription on Stan Sport.

When Nine came onboard to replace Seven at the start of last year by having most of the content behind a paywall via their own streaming arm at Stan Sport, it was initially just the opening round weekend at Symmons Plains Raceway in Tassie live on free-to-air with the rest being mid-week & next weekend two-hour replays. They even promised to put the mid-week stuff on prime time at one point to get the best out of the channel’s advertisers as well as the series itself.

But then their free-to-air highlights schedule was inconsistent & all over the place at the time while they didn’t show the Phillip Island round live at all. So to respond to that issue, they went on air the rest of 2022 with just the Saturday afternoon races Live in a two-hour window between 3-5pm. Now it’s gone from two to three hours per round with the amount of time allowed on free-to-air between 2-5pm where they showed more than just TCR Australia, Trans-Am & S5000s. Plus, their following week’s two-hour replays has improved consistently as well that starts on a Friday at noon followed by a 2nd showing either late on Saturday night or in the early hours of Sunday AM.

I’m also glad to see some International flavour when it comes to seeing the world’s best TCR drivers come here v the locals (TCR Australia) as part of the two-round TCR World Tour Australian leg here over the course of last weekend in Eastern Creek and also this weekend at Bathurst’s famed Mount Panorama Circuit. There is still one more day to go where the next day’s activities tomorrow is only on Stan Sport before the eight-round TCR Australia & SpeedSeries is done for 2023.

The only negative still out of this improved free-to-air coverage is the way Nine uses their logo which isn’t the usual Wide World of Sports watermark, although Stan Sport has made good use by showcasing their logo for the all the sports they got including Motorsport. Instead, they gone straight off 9Gem/9Go with the Live tag below it which isn’t uniquely WWOS & more like a copycat coverage of Seven or Ten, who airs racing way long enough & very well than Nine. I have also emailed my concerns to Stan about it a few months ago & although they took note of it but then they never listen. Maybe that’s because Nine & Stan are only showing it on the air & not have complete control in-house, which is under SpeedSeries itself.

There is also talk about next season’s broadcast lately since Motorsport Australia will now handle the media side of things rather than the Australian Racing Group, having taken half the control of SpeedSeries ARG that began at the start of 2023. Maybe the exit of Supercars Media running the production with the TV trucks control & graphics before the 2023 season started has probably caused Nine to revert to the 9Gem/9Go logo rather than the WWOS logo which was previously used for most of last year except Round 1. Now there is a chance that Nine as an exclusive rights holder may not be back next season.

If they’re really coming back, then great. If there is plenty of SpeedSeries articles up on the WWOS website which happens regularly, so why can’t this be extended on TV? Let’s hope it finally happens if Nine/Stan stays on. If not, we could see SpeedSeries go to Seven & Fox Sports or Ten/Paramount +. Regardless of that, the balance of having both paid & free content is here to stay that needs to cover the $$$ back to all types of participants involved as they will be back to set even more breakthroughs in 2024.

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