So much of motorsports these days involves having to explain things. Why is this car going so slow? Why are there multiple prototype classes? Why is this random race control decision fair? This clip from this weekend’s opening round of the 2025 Repco Supercars Championship has none of that. It’s just pure racing.
If you don’t watch a lot of Australian Supercars (formerly V8 Supercars), it’s a blend of classic European touring car racing and NASCAR. The racing is a lot more like the former, while the vibes are pure NASCAR, right down to the cars and sponsors.
Recently, the racing has moved from sedans to a shootout between Ford Mustangs and Chevy Camaros (it’s a bummer they don’t also race FWD Camrys). It’s the premiere racing series in Australia and it has historically produced both great drivers and great racing.
The clip below is the best example of this. Not only is it phenomenal racecraft that requires almost no explanation, there’s also just great decision-making from top to bottom. The racers are tough but respectful. Race control, wisely, allows the race to continue after some contact. The winning driver makes an incredible move at the last second to bring it all together.
You can watch the whole video above if you have time, but the key moment comes at around 11:00 minutes into this video, with just four laps to go. The only context I’ll give you that’s important is below:
- This is the second race of the year and the two Red Bull cars (Feeney and Brown) are teammates. The Monster driver in the Ford is Cam Waters.
- The Red Bull team used pit strategy to their advantage and, in particular, blocked Waters earlier in the race to slow him down.
- Waters gives back position to Feeney by blocking Brown, in theory, to avoid being accused of getting an “advantage” by dumping Feeney with four laps to go.
Enjoy it. This is as good as racing gets.
It Gets Better
This is amazing. Cam Waters won all three races of the weekend and that’s partly due to having an incredibly high racing IQ. It’s not enough to have quick reactions. You’ve got to be able to think if you want to win as a pro in a high-level series like this where the cars have reasonable parity.
Waters dumps Broc Feeney’s Camaro and is wise enough to slow down to let the driver catch up, as you can see in the video. The problem is, I’m not sure Waters realizes at first that it’s actually Feeney’s teammate Will Brown who passes him up. That means that Waters, in the middle of this three-way battle, has to engineer it so that Feeney can get by both of them by blocking Brown.
With Feeney back up front, Race Control miraculously doesn’t throw things into confusion and allows everyone to keep racing.
From there, Brown does a good job of slowing Waters down by staying on his bumper, but it’s not quite enough as the three cars separate slightly going into the last lap at Sydney Motorsports Park. Without wrecking Feeney, Waters continues to stay as close as possible to the Camaro going into the final turn.
That’s when Waters sets himself to be right on Feeney’s left rear fender on the last turn. Waters uses the Mustang to give a slight nudge to the Chevy, which slows both of them down but, more importantly, keeps Waters close enough to execute the next move.
You can see it here in the onboards:
Waters in the Mustang “side drafts” the Camaro and, similar to in NASCAR, it’s not done to speed himself up so much as to slow the other car down by forcing air into the Camaro’s rear wing like this:
Waters is effectively pushing air into the Camaro’s wing, creating downforce. It works, and Waters passes for the win.
Everything about this is pure and good for a chance. After Autopian contributor and friend Parker Kligerman won the Daytona race they took the victory away for reasons that many suspect are BS, which led to chants of “Parker Won” at Atlanta this weekend:
View this post on Instagram
It’s nice to get a result like this one in Australia where the outcome doesn’t have to be doubted.
Man. This was great racing, but seeing the Mustang start to pull ahead at the end there gave me some real goosebumps.
Genuinely thought he got a worse exit and just wouldn’t have the drive to out drag the Camaro.
NASCAR but good.
If I may suggest, the first 3 or 4 laps of the 2024 Sepang Motogp race featured over ten lead changes. Bagnaia and Martin were fighting for the championship and a crash would have ruined either of their chances. They didn’t care, they just sent it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fsyx1pcoZzU
The average MotoGP race is better than the best race in most other series.
Picked this up at the 11:00 mark….Damn, that’s racin’, boys! I need to start figuring out how to follow Aussie Super Cars, here in the US of A. I’ve always thought this was a cool series, but now I’m convinced.
Thanks for telling me that Waters won the third race too, I haven’t gotten the chance to see it yet. That said, he won the first one by 16 seconds, so I’m not surprised. By the time Race 2 ended, my jaw was in my lap. Fantastic racing!
Bruce, NoooOooOo. (All Australians are named Bruce)
Badass
Not free anymore, but AU Supercars is one of the best deals in streaming races- About US$65 and you get coverage of all the supporting races too!
Parker Won and everyone but NASTYCAR knows it!
“So much of motorsports these days involves having to explain things.” Proceeds to explain an ish ton of strategy Well the facts check out.
Lol. I didn’t HAVE To explain it. You could just watch it and completely enjoy it, but it does get better with explanation.
I read it and it went over my head, so I watched the video and went back and reread and it really helped doing it in that order so thanks. I knew the result and still got excited seeing the 0.003 second victory!
I’ve always called Aussie V8 the “stunt double” of NASCAR. Less well known, but does all the really interesting work. It seems to be influencing NASCAR, at least in their willingness to do road courses and rovals.
Also, Car of Tomorrow? In Australia, it’s always tomorrow!
Take that.
Lewin is posting about American races and Matt is posting about Australian races. What is this? Opposite day?
I heard that it wasn’t opposite day.
Yet them try that in open wheel racing 🙂
Those drivers a VERY skillful!