{"id":355853,"date":"2025-12-18T10:31:20","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T10:31:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/355853\/"},"modified":"2025-12-18T10:31:20","modified_gmt":"2025-12-18T10:31:20","slug":"motorsport-australia-names-ex-melbourne-racing-club-boss-as-new-ceo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/355853\/","title":{"rendered":"Motorsport Australia names ex-Melbourne Racing Club boss as new CEO"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/motorsport-australia_mockups_track.png\" alt=\"Motorsport Australia names ex-horse racing boss as new CEO\"\/><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tMotorsport Australia has a new CEO. Image: Supplied <\/p>\n<p>Blanksby was CEO of the MRC between 2017 and 2024 \u2013 a role that included oversight of Sandown International Motor Raceway.<\/p>\n<p>He replaces Sunil Vohra, who was <a href=\"https:\/\/speedcafe.com\/motorsport-australia-news-sunil-vohra-departs-ceo-role\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">suddenly axed from MA\u2019s top job in August.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>MA\u2019s General Manager of People and Culture, Nicky Lennon, acted as interim CEO while the recruitment process took place.<\/p>\n<p>Andrew Fraser, President of Motorsport Australia welcomed the appointment of Blanksby, who was introduced to staff today ahead of a January 27 start date.<\/p>\n<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-1015414\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/Josh-Blanksby.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1150\" height=\"768\"  \/><\/p>\n<p>Josh Blanksby. Image: Supplied<\/p>\n<p>\u201cJosh is an experienced and energetic CEO who has worked in and around sport for nearly 20 years,\u201d said Fraser.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe is commercial, astute and customer focused and understands how to lead a member-based organisation.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe see in Josh a powerful mix of experience and energy, of commercial acumen and regulatory nous.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe see someone who is passionate about their work, about service, and about sport and community and we believe he will be a successful and reforming leader for Motorsport Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Blanksby declared it an exciting time to join MA.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDuring my time in sport I have experienced first-hand that sport leadership is about the whole of the sport, the members, the volunteers, the officials as well as the elite-level competitions,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMotorsport is experiencing genuine growth in interest from new fans \u2013 here in Australia and around the world.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s an exciting time to be part of the future and to harness that interest into growing and strengthening both the sport and Motorsport Australia as the governing body.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI very much look forward to meeting people in the motorsport community in the months ahead.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Since leaving the MRC, Blanksby has been working as principal of sports, wagering and gaming focused consultancy firm AP2 Advisory.<\/p>\n<p>He was the director of legal and corporate affairs at Betfair for eight years prior joining the MRC in 2014, initially in a legal role.<\/p>\n<p><a data-bid=\"1\" data-no-instant=\"1\" href=\"https:\/\/t.cfjump.com\/92797\/b\/285249\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" target=\"_blank\"><br \/><img decoding=\"async\" style=\"border: none; vertical-align: middle;\" src=\"https:\/\/t.cfjump.com\/92797\/a\/285249\" alt=\"\"\/><br \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Motorsport Australia has a new CEO. Image: Supplied Blanksby was CEO of the MRC between 2017 and 2024&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":355854,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,194959,194960,806,805,803,804,6490,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-355853","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-josh-blanksby","11":"tag-melbourne-racing-club","12":"tag-motor","13":"tag-motor-sports","14":"tag-motosport","15":"tag-motosports","16":"tag-slot3","17":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355853","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=355853"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/355853\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/355854"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=355853"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=355853"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=355853"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}