{"id":606018,"date":"2026-09-20T07:42:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-20T07:42:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/606018\/"},"modified":"2026-09-20T07:42:12","modified_gmt":"2026-09-20T07:42:12","slug":"tom-bewley-rising-kiwi-motorsport-talents-career-in-jeopardy-over-lack-of-sponsorship","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/606018\/","title":{"rendered":"Tom Bewley: Rising Kiwi motorsport talent\u2019s career in jeopardy over lack of sponsorship"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bewley\u2019s situation is so desperate, his fourth-place finish last time out came with no sponsor on his car. And with just weeks to get prospective backers on board, the teenager makes no bones of his situation. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s always pretty tough,\u201d he told the Herald. \u201cTrying to make it to Bathurst and the last three rounds in general is pretty make or break.<\/p>\n

\"TomTom Bewley celebrates his pole position at The Bend. Photo \/ Supplied<\/p>\n

\u201cI need to get to the last three rounds. They\u2019re the toughest circuits and you need experience on those types of tracks. We need to try and find the budget, which is very hard at the moment with how everything is.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we can\u2019t get the budget together, there\u2019ll be no more racing \u2013 at least for the rest of this year. We\u2019ll try as hard as we can to go racing next year, but that will be the end for this year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been making big steps against a really competitive field, and pro drivers. It will be a huge shame if we can\u2019t make the last three rounds.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sadly, Bewley\u2019s situation is far from unique. A lack of funds has killed more Kiwi careers than a lack of talent ever has.<\/p>\n

Earlier this year, Kiwi Louis Sharp was this year forced to withdraw from the rest of the 2026 Formula Three season for the same reason. <\/p>\n

Despite New Zealand being an overachiever in motorsport \u2013 with drivers in Formula One, Formula E, Nascar, IndyCar, Supercars and endurance racing series \u2013 financial constraints have always been the biggest roadblock to reaching the highest levels.<\/p>\n

Helping Bewley, is the fact one of the most influential figures in New Zealand motorsport is in his corner, Christchurch-based Grant McDonald.<\/p>\n

McDonald is the long-time mentor and former manager of Liam Lawson<\/a>, and has taken on a similar role with Bewley to help him on his way to success, including winning the 2023-24 Toyota 86 Championship in his second season, to secure the Team Porsche New Zealand Scholarship, en route to racing in Australia. <\/p>\n

\u201cWithout him, I\u2019d be nowhere,\u201d Bewley said of McDonald. \u201cHe works so hard, and he\u2019s got a lot going on in his own personal life.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d be nowhere without the work he\u2019s put in to get me the deals and the opportunities to race over the last two years.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo be able to race these last two years as part of the Porsche New Zealand Scholarship with Giltrap Group and Earl Bamber Motorsport has been amazing \u2013 that\u2019s all come from Grant\u2019s hard work.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for the future, if and when the right funding is secured, Bewley makes no bones about where he wants to go in motorsport. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe short-term goal would be to try and get into a factory team or manufacturer drive,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n

\"TomTom Bewley races in Darwin. Photo \/ Supplied<\/p>\n

\u201cThen maybe end up doing DTM or World Endurance Championship \u2013 one of those would be incredible. That\u2019s what I\u2019ve wanted to do my whole life. <\/p>\n

\u201cEveryone says they want to go to Supercars or Formula One. But I\u2019ve always been a bit different, I\u2019ve wanted to follow what Earl Bamber and Brendon Hartley, those guys, have done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Alex Powell<\/a> is a sports journalist for the NZ Herald. He has been a sports journalist since 2016.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bewley\u2019s situation is so desperate, his fourth-place finish last time out came with no sponsor on his car.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":606019,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[9218,11154,298633,2046,803,124,19552,23966,36091,78,255048,194,27135,3514,111,139,69,1118,1523,3512,801,24352,76612,213,56383,5134,86662,53923],"class_list":["post-606018","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-before","tag-begins","tag-bewley","tag-career","tag-continue","tag-could","tag-driver","tag-enough","tag-funds","tag-in","tag-jeopardy","tag-kiwi","tag-lack","tag-motorsport","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-of","tag-over","tag-racing","tag-rising","tag-secure","tag-sponsorship","tag-sports","tag-talents","tag-tom","tag-truly","tag-unless"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606018","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=606018"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606018\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/606019"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=606018"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=606018"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=606018"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}