{"id":756251,"date":"2026-06-24T01:48:21","date_gmt":"2026-06-24T01:48:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/756251\/"},"modified":"2026-06-24T01:48:21","modified_gmt":"2026-06-24T01:48:21","slug":"supercars-legend-mark-skaife-doubles-down-on-team-18-criticism","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/756251\/","title":{"rendered":"Supercars legend Mark Skaife doubles down on Team 18 criticism"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\u2018Stand
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tSupercars commentator and six-time Bathurst 1000 winner Mark Skaife. Image: Richard Gresham <\/p>\n

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

Skaife had declared on MotorRacing 360 earlier this month<\/a> that GM had \u201cdone nothing\u201d in the near 18 months since Triple Eight signed a deal to defect to Ford.<\/p>\n

The Holden legend was particularly critical of GM\u2019s choice of replacement homologation squad Team 18, declaring it\u2019s \u201cnot operating like a proper factory team\u201d.<\/p>\n

That was not lost on Team 18 owner Charlie Schwerkolt in the aftermath of Anton De Pasquale\u2019s victory, noting \u201cit\u2019s a shame Mark Skaife is not here to see this win\u201d.<\/a><\/p>\n

Skaife is not part of the travelling Supercars circus this year having been axed from the commentary team, but has bitten back via a column in the Daily Telegraph.<\/a><\/p>\n

Although stressing that if he was in Darwin he would have congratulated Schwerkolt and De Pasquale, Skaife said he \u201cstands by every word\u201d of his earlier comments.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne win doesn\u2019t change my position. Not even slightly,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

Skaife compared Team 18\u2019s 2026 win rate to Triple Eight\u2019s last year, and underlined the lack of GM success this season against Ford and newcomer Toyota.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is the chasm. And unfortunately, one win in Darwin does not bridge it,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n

Skaife also criticised Schwerkolt\u2019s Darwin victory lap, suggesting \u201cgreat winning cultures in Australian sport\u201d are about sustained performance.<\/p>\n

\u201cAsk yourself this \u2013 would [Wayne] Bennett be out there calling out his critics after one win in round seven?\u201d Skaife wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cWould [Craig] Bellamy be beating his chest and pointing fingers? Not a chance.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose champions let results do the talking, and they don\u2019t stop demanding more until the trophy is theirs at the end of the season.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat is the standard. That is what a genuine winning culture looks like.<\/p>\n

\u201c[Charlie] can take a shot at me every time they win a race. That\u2019s fine. In fact. I would be delighted to be proven wrong.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the best interest of the sport and the historic tribal rivalry which I was proud to be a part of, we need GM to be strong.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur loyal fans deserve it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Schwerkolt claps back at Skaife criticism<\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Skaife will be joined on tonight\u2019s MotorRacing 360 by Team 18 principal Adrian Burgess.<\/p>\n

Asked by Speedcafe on Sunday whether Skaife\u2019s comments had been discussed inside the team ahead of Darwin, Burgess also took a veiled swipe at the former HRT driver and owner.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt didn\u2019t get discussed for very long because you don\u2019t bother listening to comments like that,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s entitled to his opinion. I don\u2019t think he knows the address of the factory, let alone ever been in it, so I don\u2019t think he\u2019s really qualified to say what\u2019s going on inside our business.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only way for us is to just keep our head down, keep motivated, keep executing and not worry about distractions and do your job.\u201d<\/p>\n

Burgess, who was the principal of the Holden Racing Team when it lost its GM factory status to Triple Eight, denied the HT tag has added pressure this season.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think teams put enough pressure on themselves anyway, you do as drivers, as owners, as team principals,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re here to win whether you\u2019re a homologation team or a customer team.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the end of the day if you\u2019re not here trying to win in whichever role you\u2019re in, then you shouldn\u2019t be in the sport.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t feel any more pressure. There\u2019s maybe a bit more expectation but we put enough of that on ourselves anyway, to improve and do a better job, day in, day out.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Supercars commentator and six-time Bathurst 1000 winner Mark Skaife. Image: Richard Gresham Skaife had declared on MotorRacing 360…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":756252,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[52916,64,63,52917,127332,806,805,803,804,12357,85,42657],"class_list":["post-756251","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-motosport","tag-adrian-burgess","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-charlie-schwerkolt","tag-mark-skaife","tag-motor","tag-motor-sports","tag-motosport","tag-motosports","tag-slot1","tag-sports","tag-team-18"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/756251","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=756251"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/756251\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/756252"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=756251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=756251"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=756251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}