{"id":271995,"date":"2025-11-08T22:57:15","date_gmt":"2025-11-08T22:57:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/271995\/"},"modified":"2025-11-08T22:57:15","modified_gmt":"2025-11-08T22:57:15","slug":"team-18-signs-james-courtney-for-2026-supercars-co-drive-bathurst-1000","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/271995\/","title":{"rendered":"Team 18 signs James Courtney for 2026 Supercars co-drive, Bathurst 1000"},"content":{"rendered":"

TEAM 18 has announced the signature of Supercars champion James Courtney<\/a> for 2026 and beyond.<\/p>\n

Courtney will join the squad\u2019s co-driving ranks alongside Lee Holdsworth<\/a> next season, the latter having helped David Reynolds<\/a> to a runner-up finish in this year\u2019s Bathurst 1000.<\/p>\n

Team 18 is yet to confirm pairings \u2013 i.e. whether Reynolds and Holdsworth will remain intact, which would make for an Anton De Pasquale<\/a>\/Courtney combination.<\/p>\n

Courtney\u2019s arrival, following the final two rounds of his full-time career with the Blanchard Racing Team, means Harri Jones<\/a> is out unless he can land the incoming Supercheap Auto wildcard drive along Craig Lowndes<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Either way, it\u2019s a long-awaited reunion for Courtney, team owner Charlie Schwerkolt and team principal Adrian Burgess \u2013 the trio having combined for a famous Dick Johnson<\/a> Racing title boilover 15 years ago.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s really special to welcome James into the Team 18 family. This is a massive signing for Team 18, a real coup,\u201d said Schwerkolt.<\/p>\n

\u201cJames is a proven champion and one of the sport\u2019s most respected and recognisable names, and there was no shortage of interest in his signature once he announced his retirement.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt took a lot of convincing, but we made it clear from the start how much we wanted him.<\/p>\n

\u201cSecuring someone of his calibre shows our intent as a team and where we want to go, we\u2019re here to win races and to proudly represent Chevrolet as the homologation partner moving forward.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s our job to prepare a package that can go out there and get the job done.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cTo reunite with James after the success we shared in 2010 is something really special.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve stayed great friends since that championship year, and to now have him join what we\u2019ve built at Team 18 for the next chapter of his career feels like things have come full circle.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow comes the fun part, deciding who he goes with! Between James and Lee as our co-drivers, and Anton and Dave as our main drivers, we\u2019ve got one of the strongest four-driver line-ups in pit lane to take on the Great Race next year.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is worth noting that announcement imagery involved Courtney in Snowy River Caravans-branded clothing, with it widely expected the sponsor will follow him to Team 18.<\/p>\n

Team 18\u2019s confirmation of Courtney and Holdsworth follows Walkinshaw Andretti United (Jaxon Evans<\/a> and Fabian Coulthard<\/a>) and PremiAir Racing (David Russell<\/a> and Nash Morris<\/a>) naming their 2026 co-drivers.<\/p>\n

\"\"Pic: Supplied<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TEAM 18 has announced the signature of Supercars champion James Courtney for 2026 and beyond. Courtney will join…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":271996,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[43,44,41,39,42,40],"class_list":{"0":"post-271995","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271995","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=271995"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/271995\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/271996"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=271995"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=271995"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=271995"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}