{"id":338830,"date":"2025-12-10T06:32:13","date_gmt":"2025-12-10T06:32:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/338830\/"},"modified":"2025-12-10T06:32:13","modified_gmt":"2025-12-10T06:32:13","slug":"former-kimi-antonelli-rival-robert-de-haan-samples-v8-supercars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/338830\/","title":{"rendered":"Former Kimi Antonelli rival Robert de Haan samples V8 Supercars"},"content":{"rendered":"

NOT all that long ago, Robert de Haan was duking it out with Kimi Antonelli as top-of-the-class karting foes.<\/p>\n

Antonelli of course has gone on to become a Formula 1 star. He has just wrapped up his maiden season with Mercedes, where he replaced seven-time world champion Lewis Hamilton and claimed three grands prix podiums.<\/p>\n

Similarly 19 years of age, de Haan has carved out a niche in Porsche one-make racing.<\/p>\n

The Dutchman won the Belgium\/Netherlands-based Carrera Cup Benelux crown in 2023 and this year conquered the German competition while also finishing title runner-up in Porsche Supercup.<\/p>\n

You might be thinking, why is all this relevant to a predominantly Australian readership?<\/p>\n

Well, not only did de Haan pop up at the recent Adelaide Grand Final<\/a> in Carrera Cup Australia (where he showed excellent pace until being caught out by the torrential Friday conditions), but he yesterday got his first taste of Supercars.<\/p>\n

\"\"Robert de Haan at the head of the Carrera Cup field in Adelaide. Pic: Ross Gibb<\/p>\n

The highly rated de Haan was one of three drivers to cycle through Kai Allen<\/a>\u2019s #26 Penrite Gen3 Mustang at a Grove Racing evaluation day at Winton Motor Raceway.<\/p>\n

Toyota GR Cup champion Oliver Wickham and Trans Am sensation Blake Tracey also turned laps with the Groves.<\/p>\n

Another international young gun, Marcus Amand, had been touted to join them but that did not eventuate after the Finn got the nod as one of two Porsche Juniors for 2026 following his success in the marque\u2019s annual shootout.<\/p>\n

For de Haan, it\u2019s unclear if any further Supercars opportunities will eventuate, but it\u2019s worth noting the Groves have been successful in attracting esteemed foreign talent before, from endurance ace Kevin Estre to ex-Ferrari F1 engineer Riccardo Corte<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Grove Racing\u2019s evaluation day followed news that it has parted ways with long-time junior driver Oscar Targett<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NOT all that long ago, Robert de Haan was duking it out with Kimi Antonelli as top-of-the-class karting…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":338831,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-338830","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-motosport","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-motor","11":"tag-motor-sports","12":"tag-motosport","13":"tag-motosports","14":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338830","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=338830"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/338830\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/338831"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=338830"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=338830"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=338830"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}