The Supercars championship has become Australia's invisible sporting championship, with the sport choosing to race in New Zealand on a reduced budget. This decision has created an unexpected issue for the sport, as it now faces a lengthy and laborious operation to ship the gear and cars to New Zealand, resulting in a frustrating period of eleven weeks without racing in Australia. The sport needs momentum, regular events, and consistent storylines, but Supercars is simply going missing for the first half of its season. This is a shame, as the first four events have been brilliant, spicy, and unpredictable, which is a rarity in many forms of motorsport. The time between races, especially on these shores, is not one of the sport's strengths. The feud between Brodie Kostecki and Chaz Mostert has festered for five weeks, with the final race at Ruapuna in Christchurch highlighted by a desperate Kostecki having to pass Mostert to claim the prestigious Jason Richards Trophy. Mostert played brutally hard ball and sent his fellow Ford driver packing, earning the reigning Supercars champ a 30-second time penalty and ruining Kostecki's race and championship lead. This sets a fascinating subplot for the Supercars return at Symmons Plains, where both on the track and in the garages post-race, fireworks are expected. Matt Payne remains the hottest commodity in the sport, with his stocks rising after winning his last start in Christchurch. He is locked in a bidding war for his services, with Chevrolet desperate to poach him away from Grove Racing. Chevrolet knows they have to splash the cash to entice a big name, and that man is Payne, the defending Bathurst 1000 champion and one of the rising stars of the sport. Chevrolet is throwing the kitchen sink to ensure this deal gets done, using their global powers to entice the young gun. The 888 team has been bulletproof at Symmons Plains, with Jamie Whincup winning there a record thirteen times and Craig Lowndes on ten occasions. However, this weekend is their first at the Apple Island running Mustangs, and the question is whether they can make their Mustangs go as fast as their Chevys. After five long weeks off and eleven weeks away from racing in Australia, Symmons Plains hosts the iconic circuit's 100th championship race on Saturday afternoon. The racing has been fierce and fiery all season, with six different winners from five different teams across the 13 races. However, the scheduling conflict with the AFL doubleheader and the AFL's biggest moment of the century, with Scott Pendlebury breaking the all-time AFL games record, will make it tough for Supercars to pull a crowd on Saturday. Hopefully, Sunday's 84-lapper beginning at 2:45 will pull a bigger audience.
