{"id":384454,"date":"2026-04-17T16:26:13","date_gmt":"2026-04-17T16:26:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/384454\/"},"modified":"2026-04-17T16:26:13","modified_gmt":"2026-04-17T16:26:13","slug":"supercars-news-the-ominous-sign-for-toyotas-rivals-after-first-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/384454\/","title":{"rendered":"Supercars news: The ominous sign for Toyota\u2019s rivals after first win"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\"The
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\tWalkinshaw TWG Racing’s Ryan Wood on track at Ruapuna. Image: InSyde Media<\/p>\n

Ryan Wood took his Supra to victory at Taupo last Saturday, giving Toyota a win in just its ninth Supercars Championship race start.<\/p>\n

Curiously, the result was followed by news that both the Chevrolet and Toyota triggered the new parity review system, lagging behind the Ford on the lap-time-based equation.<\/p>\n

While Chevrolet has received an aerodynamic tweak for Ruapuna, there\u2019s no change to the Toyota for now while development continues between Walkinshaw and Supercars on the engine.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere is work to be done on the engine and it\u2019s very tightly controlled with Supercars,\u201d Bruce Stewart told media at Ruapuna.<\/p>\n

\u201cReliability is the first thing we\u2019ve got to build, it\u2019s a cornerstone of Toyota and their brand and what they stand for, and we\u2019re not perfect there yet.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen secondly, power, there is still a little bit of a hole in there that we need to develop.\u201d<\/p>\n

Supercars has made minor engine mapping tweaks to the Toyota since its debut, while an emergency cylinder head revision took place following a failure in the Sydney season opener.<\/p>\n

The early success of Toyota has been hailed by Supercars bosses, with Barclay Nettlefold declaring it opens the door for a fourth manufacturer to enter.<\/p>\n

Rival teams, however, have given mixed reactions to the early Supra success.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think it\u2019s incredibly impressive,\u201d said Dick Johnson Racing team manager Tom Moore, sitting alongside Stewart in the Friday press conference.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re a very strong race team with two very strong drivers, so I wouldn\u2019t say it\u2019s a surprise.<\/p>\n

\u201cProbably expected\u2026 not that early, but expected eventually [for them to win].\u201d<\/p>\n

Erebus boss Barry Ryan also praised Walkinshaw for its efforts, albeit with a key caveat about the future.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I saw the aero figures when they first got approved, I thought, this is going to be a tough situation,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey did a really good job of it and they\u2019ve done a good job of getting to where they are with a new engine and everything.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s good for the sport, Toyota winning, you\u2019ve got to tick that box, and hopefully they don\u2019t dominate, especially when it comes to the October race.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Walkinshaw TWG Racing’s Ryan Wood on track at Ruapuna. Image: InSyde Media Ryan Wood took his Supra to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":384455,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[111,139,69,213,154397],"class_list":{"0":"post-384454","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-new-zealand","9":"tag-newzealand","10":"tag-nz","11":"tag-sports","12":"tag-walkinshaw-twg-racing"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=384454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384454\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/384455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=384454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=384454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=384454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}