{"id":788338,"date":"2026-07-09T03:26:17","date_gmt":"2026-07-09T03:26:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/788338\/"},"modified":"2026-07-09T03:26:17","modified_gmt":"2026-07-09T03:26:17","slug":"supercars-wildcard-paradox-of-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/788338\/","title":{"rendered":"Supercars\u2019 wildcard paradox of 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

SUPERCARS\u2019 wildcard season opens this weekend with a pair of cars joining the field for the NTI Townsville 500.<\/p>\n

Namely, Aaron Seton<\/a> will make his solo Repco Supercars Championship debut for Matt Stone Racing, while for Tickford Racing\u2019s Reuben Goodall<\/a> it\u2019s his first appearance in the main game altogether.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an entr\u00e9e of sorts to an even bigger grid next month at Queensland Raceway, where Seton, Ben Gomersall<\/a> (Tickford) and Bayley Hall<\/a> (Team 18) will all be in action in addition to the 24 regulars.<\/p>\n

PremiAir Racing too had explored a Nash Morris<\/a>-driven third entry for the Ipswich Super440 before pulling the pin.<\/p>\n

\"\"Aaron Seton will compete in a solo wildcard at Townsville and Ipswich before pairing up with Zach Bates<\/a> for the enduros. Pic: Supplied<\/p>\n

Nevertheless, 27 cars for QR represents the biggest field for a single-driver event in the Gen3 era \u2013 and indeed since the 2022 Tailem Bend SuperSprint.<\/p>\n

Yet at the same time, Supercars is tracking towards its smallest Bathurst 1000 grid in half a decade (i.e. 2021).<\/p>\n

As it stands, Team 18\u2019s high-profile Supercheap Auto effort for Hall and Craig Lowndes<\/a> is the only Great Race wildcard locked in, making for a 25-car Mount Panorama entry list unless any late additions pop up out of the woodworks.<\/p>\n

The determining factor in the paradox is the presence of Super2, with Tickford and MSR rediverted resources on weekends without the second tier but unwilling to spread themselves too thin when double duties arise.<\/p>\n

The Undercut \u2013 How hot is too hot?<\/p>\n

The Undercut is back for another week, downloading a hot weekend in the Top End for Supercars!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SUPERCARS\u2019 wildcard season opens this weekend with a pair of cars joining the field for the NTI Townsville…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":788339,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[572],"tags":[64,63,806,805,803,804,85],"class_list":["post-788338","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\/788338","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=788338"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/788338\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/788339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=788338"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=788338"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=788338"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}