Outgoing David Noble has admitted he believes Supercars needs to spend and invest to hit their target of becoming the nation’s “number three sport.”
Amid a breakout year for the category, including the blockbuster announcement of Toyota joining the grid for 2026 and a knockout Bathurst 1000 race, Noble said the sport needs to keep pace with the rest of the sporting landscape in Australia and its rapid expansion.
“Supercars just needs to keep an eye on the landscape going forward,” Noble admitted.
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“AFL last year said they’re going to spend a billion dollars in the next 10 years on talent identification. NRL are doing the same, they’re expanding, they’re going to LA (he meant Vegas), they’re going international.
David Noble joined Supercars after being at the helm of North Melbourne AFL club. Â Getty
“You look at the Olympic movement at the moment coming into 2032 – Queensland will have the biggest athletic budget it’s ever had in the expansion of athlete development in the next 10 years and New South Wales will be the same.”
He argued that Supercars cannot sit on their hands while other sports continually invest millions and invest in the longevity of their younger generations.
“I’m hoping that Supercars can see that they continually need to move and adapt and improve the sport in order to compete,” he added.
“If James [Warburton, Supercars CEO] is good for his word and says that he wants to be the number three sport in the nation, then he’s going to need to do it, because the other sports around them are having a fair crack at spending money.
“So hopefully he can actually come to the party and make this sport move in the direction I think it can actually move into.”
Ford will join both Chevrolet and newcomer Toyota on the 2026 grid. Â Getty
It’s early days, but the introduction of the Supercars Finals appears to be having a positive impact, with the Gold Coast 500 watched by 1.38 million TV viewers nationally, a 13 per cent increase year-on-year. Still, Noble clearly feels there’s more work to be done to compete with AFL and NRL, not to mention cricket, which is about to be the centre of the sporting conversation in Australia as the Ashes series takes over for two months.
Founder of Boost Mobile, Peter Adderton, blasted Supercars back in July saying “the sport is broken” and there was no willingness to invest.
“Supercars teams want more money to race and Supercars have no more money to give and it’s not growing. Only new owners [are] willing to invest, real money will fix the sport,” he posted on Facebook.
Supercars will compete for the final time in Adelaide on November 27-30.
The 2026 season will have a 14-race calendar that is headlined by a double-header weekend in New Zealand.