{"id":754430,"date":"2026-06-23T05:55:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-23T05:55:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/754430\/"},"modified":"2026-06-23T05:55:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T05:55:13","slug":"aasa-sale-disputed-by-benalla-auto-club","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/754430\/","title":{"rendered":"AASA sale disputed by Benalla Auto Club"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>CLAIMS that the Australian Auto-Sport Alliance has changed hands have been disputed by the organisation\u2019s long-time owner, the Benalla Auto Club.<\/p>\n<p>An announcement came Sunday night through official AASA channels <a href=\"https:\/\/www.v8sleuth.com.au\/aasa-sold-by-benalla-auto-club\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">that a consortium had acquired the sanctioning body at the start of 2026<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Les Smith, Michael FitzGerald, Peter Washington and Stephen Whyte were listed as the quartet behind the investment group which had made the alleged purchase.<\/p>\n<p>FitzGerald was the BAC\u2019s secretary; it\u2019s understood he was removed from that position a matter of weeks ago.<\/p>\n<p>Legal action is on the cards, for which reason V8 Sleuth has closed comments sections on social media posts relating to this story.<\/p>\n<p>There are hopes of an imminent resolution being reached; regardless it\u2019s understood that any such legal proceedings will have no impact on the upcoming round of the AASA-sanctioned Hi-Tec Oils Super Series to be held at Sydney Motorsport Park across July 17-18.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/superstore.v8sleuth.com.au\/products\/1-18-scale-1970-bathurst-500-53-ford-falcon-xw-goss-skelton-model?utm_source=website&amp;utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_campaign=buy-button&amp;utm_content=buy-button\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/CC-18843_1024x1024.jpg\"\/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The BAC distributed communications to its members this morning entitled: \u201cAASA \u2013 NOT FOR SALE\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>The memo, which has been obtained by V8 Sleuth, reads as follows:<\/p>\n<p>The Benalla Auto Club Committee (BAC) wishes to clarify its position following public claims that the Australian Auto-Sport Alliance (AASA) was sold to a group of investors earlier this year.<\/p>\n<p>BAC does not accept that any valid sale of the AASA has occurred and rejects any suggestions that the Benalla Auto Club Committee approved, supported, or endorsed such a transaction.<\/p>\n<p>The Committee states that it was unaware of the purported sale until recent weeks and has serious concerns regarding the circumstances surrounding the alleged transfer.<\/p>\n<p>As a result, BAC is preparing legal action to protect its interests and those of its members.<\/p>\n<p>Importantly, BAC wishes to reassures members, competitors, promoters, sponsors, officials, and the broader motorsport community that it remains business as usual for both the Benalla Auto Club and Winton Motor Raceway.<\/p>\n<p>Motor sport stalwart Jeff Grech has assumed the role of Group CEO.<\/p>\n<p>The Club continues to own and operate Winton Motor Raceway and its associated facilities, and stakeholders should continue to deal with BAC, AASA, or the Winton Motor Raceway in the usual way.<\/p>\n<p>V8 Sleuth has attempted to seek comment from the group claiming to now own AASA.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CLAIMS that the Australian Auto-Sport Alliance has changed hands have been disputed by the organisation\u2019s long-time owner, the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":754431,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":["post-754430","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/754430","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=754430"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/754430\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/754431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=754430"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=754430"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=754430"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}