PR: TOCA Australia Relinquish Management Rights to Australian Super Touring

[RaceTime]

TOCA Australia Relinquishes Management Rights To Super Touring
Championship

SEPTEMBER 27, 2001:

TOCA Australia today announced that it would not proceed with the
organisation of the 2001-02 Australian Super Touring Championship and
has relinquished its rights to manage the category in Australia.

"The Board has considered all matters in reaching this very difficult
decision," said TOCA Australia Chief Executive Kelvin O’Reilly

"We regret that this decision has had to be made but the surrounding
circumstances and the commercial climate make it unavoidable."

"As there are numerous cars that are eligible for competition in both
Super Touring and Future Touring specification the field is now open for the governing body CAMS or another category manager to organise these events."

Power Tour organiser Nick Ebbeck last week extended an invitation to the Super Touring/Future Touring teams and Commodore Cup competitors to race at their next event, which is scheduled for Winton on 21 October.

Ends.

No further statements will be provided

[Buckshot]

Looks like they've finally laid the corpse to rest...

[racer69]

The thing is it only says TOCA will have nothing to do with the category from now on, it just depends what CAMS will do, will they kill the series, promote it themselves or give it to another promoter to manage, like PowerTour for example.

Remember last year when CAMS tried to get the running of the V8s away from AVESCO, because it wanted to run the Touring Car series themselves, this would provide them with the opportunity to build their own Touring Car Championship, but is it worth it?

And what does this mean for TOCA Australia, will they just die or do something else. And what about Terry Morris who owns the TOCA Tourers category. There are many unanswered questions, even the website has shut down.

It seems that the only reason TOCA quit was because channel 7 for some reason wouldn't show the championship.

[D.R.T.]

Yes, many questions , no answers. I don't believe this will be the end of super touring, there are cars , drivers and teams willing to compete.

[RaceTime]

Well the web site hasn't shut down exactly - it is displaying the 'We Relinquish' statement and nothing else.

From conversations I have had in the past hour it appears that there are still 39 Super tourer cars in Australia available to race. At least one track is currently trying to set up a mini-series for them and they have been on the phones for the past 24 hours trying to accomplish this.

When I get more info on this will pass it on.

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by racer69
Remember last year when CAMS tried to get the running of the V8s away from AVESCO, because it wanted to run the Touring Car series themselves, this would provide them with the opportunity to build their own Touring Car Championship, but is it worth it?

CAMS tried to get more money out of AVESCO, both more than AVESCO were giving them and more than they'd contracted for. AVESCO killed them, from what I understand, which helps explain my view on this:

The thing is it only says TOCA will have nothing to do with the category from now on, it just depends what CAMS will do, will they kill the series, promote it themselves or give it to another promoter to manage, like PowerTour for example.

They are incapable of doing anything positive, it will either die or they will ride it to destruction... at a cost, undoubtedly, to the remaining members of the CAMS.

[Crash Test]

The cars will be allowed to race in the National Sports Sedan Championship next year, if nothing else. By the sounds of it, TOCA had serious dramas making a grid out of those 39 cars, so what is MPG going to do differently? There may be cars, drivers, and teams willing to compete, but it is now blindingly clear, that there aren't enough out there...

[RaceTime]

Forgot to mention - although there are 39 cars around, it is uncertain at this stage how many are race ready!

And the information I had this morning was that Oran park only had 3 entries!

[mtpanorama]

Originally posted by RaceTime
Forgot to mention - although there are 39 cars around, it is uncertain at this stage how many are race ready!

I know of two Vectras here in bathurst, They are about as race ready as the ones the local holden dealer has on the showroom floor


Can we play the death march now.

[Ray Bell]

Originally posted by Crash Test
The cars will be allowed to race in the National Sports Sedan Championship next year, if nothing else.

Of course, all they need is the original roofline and they can do that... run against the 6-litre V8 hybrids.

Strange thing, they good ones will give them a hard time... but is this what they want?

[Airhead]

So once again we are spoilt for choice.

Ford - Holden in the hands of the repulsive Tony Cochrane, or.....

I think I'll go back to speedway.

[Crash Test]

Ray- Starting next year, the National Sports Sedans will allow invitational type cars to compete...they are lining up things like Trans Ams (especially from NZ) and if any Super Tourers wanted in, they could run with their sequential boxes etc.

[racer69]

I agree about the Tony C

Was this outcome very surprising though, i don't think so. The only surprising thing is that there is no championship anymore. Most Super Touring Championships around the world have gone, Germany changed to DTM 2000, Fance has switched to some silouette formula (actually similiar to last years ASTC, in that in france they have super tourers and this silouette formula), and others have passed on.

The mistake TOCA made was waiting too long to get these TOCA Tourers going, if they had have adoptedt them for the 2000 series, then the class would still have been fresh, rather than only really getting them going now, when they are old news, and having this happen.

What are the chances of a category like ST ever starting up again in Australia in the future. I fear none in the short term.

[Michael H]

This is indeed a sad day for Australian motorsport.

TOCA - thanks for the memories. It was a great journey.

[racer69]

Definatly a sad day, not all is lost though.

If this mini- series thing gets going then at least the likes of Auger, Hills, Dale and Cornish will have somewhere to compete.

Something i don't get is that there were apparently 3 entries for Oran Park, yet apparently 16 Future Tourers are going to winton on octber 21. Does this mean that for this season the Super Tourers and Future Tourers were going to be split. The three cars i can think of that i have read about in AA recently are the Hills/Dale Mondeo's and the Cornish Vectra. Yet i received email from Miller and Auger saying they were definatly in.

Over time all questions will be answered and the truth will come out hopefully.

[kmchow]

racer69 wrote:

>The only surprising thing is that there is no championship anymore. >Most Super Touring Championships around the world have gone,
>
Well, for sure the STCC and ETCC are doing fine! Have you chcked out the Works/semi-works participation? France still races ST/Silhouette cars together. The ST cars run with a weight penalty I think. So ST is not officially dead yet, just in "near coma" state with occassional signs of activity!! ;-)

I think the South American ST series may still be racing as well. They should be down to about 5-10 cars/race, but I admit they are struggling with a change in promoter/organizer.

[D.R.T.]

I feel that there were alot more than three cars entered. And that the problem was to do with Channel 7 not showing the races this year.
It would terrible if these great machines were reduced to racing in under 2 litre sports sedans, I thought thats where old v8 supercars ended up.

[RaceTime]

Originally posted by D.R.T.
I feel that there were alot more than three cars entered. And that the problem was to do with Channel 7 not showing the races this year.

The actual number of entries for the meeting came from the organisers - not from TOCA. There may have been more intending to enter, however, by close of entries, only 3 had been confirmed.

[racer69]

I think part of the problem is uncertainty. Round 1 was cancelled, Round 2 is i suppose cancelled, and all of a sudden they are invited to Winton, so nobody really knows what is going on. No one wants to commit to a championship that may or may not happen.

[Shazza]

Am I the only one who can see this heading to court? I thought Channel 7 had a broadcast contract with TOCA and they couldn't just break it like that. Their decision has pretty much killed off TOCA.

Could be interesting...

[Crash Test]

Well TOCA didn't have a product to be broadcast in the first place... it's more a case of self inflicted death, they were only broadcast on Channel 7 because they paid for it, if they continued to pay for it, they would continue to get coverage- pretty simple.

[RaceTime]

Shazza,

No this won't head to court - the agreement was 'mutaually' terminated by both parties.

Besides - I understand TOCA were actually paying for the telvising of the races.

[D.R.T.]

Speaking to a few of the Super Touring drivers they have said that the future looks brighter than it would have been if the series would have continued on as normal. "Apparently" the first 2 rounds of the series will be part of the Power Tour. Also commented was that they are now with track promoters and not CAMS , things will be much easier and exciting for the future. So for all you guys crying about the end of Super Tourers, no need as they will be around for a good while yet. You can save up all the tears for Murray Walker and Akira Yanagawa's last hurrah. We'll miss you guys.

[RaceTime]

Which rounds are they talking about? Round 1 will obviously be Winton - what is expected to be round 2?

And the Wakefield Park round in November? What do they know about that now?

[D.R.T.]

Unsure, though I will investigate to the end. Isn't it great that the Super Tourers are still going, shaky, but things are improving. The Super Tourers had been scheduled for a 500km endurance race this year, with them joining the PowerTour do you guys believe this will still go ahead. This would be quite a specticle one the one show to have Super Tourers, TOCA Tourers, Trucks, Nascars and Daewoos. I hope this goes ahead, it would be magnificent.