Weekend Preview: Townsville 500
A quick look ahead at a big weekend of sport in the 'Ville
The next event on the Supercars calendar is the "Thrill in the 'Ville" 2025 NTI Townsville 500. This year's event will feature a collaboration with Professional Bull Riding to bring the rodeo to the racetrack on Friday. It heralds a big week in sport, with the State of Origin decider on Wednesday (today, albeit played in Sydney), Supercars all weekend, and the North Queensland Cowboys taking on the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs at Queensland Country Bank Stadium. On a personal note, I will be attending the race in person for the first time which I'm very excited about. It's always more fun covering racing in person rather than through a broadcast.
About the Event
The Townsville Street Circuit is a temporary circuit located in Reid Park, Townsville. The track is 2.86km in length, with 13 turns. The lap record is held by Scott McLaughlin, set at 1:11.9908 in 2017. This weekend differs from the previous Sprint Cup rounds which used the Super440 format. Three races will be held across the weekend, with one per day in the afternoon. Top ten shootouts will be used in qualifying in Races 21 and 22 (Saturday and Sunday), whereas Race 20 will have only the two-part qualifying session which is also used for the other two races.
There are 315 points on offer, including bonus points for fastest laps. These will be distributed across a 35-lap race on Friday, followed by two 70-lap races on Saturday and Sunday. These longer races should hopefully open up some room for a strategy race. This weekend will also feature Dunlop Super2, the V8 SuperUtes, Porsche Michelin Sprint Challenge Australia, Australia GR Cup, and Summernats. Additionally, some cars will still be running their Indigenous round liveries this weekend, which is always exciting to see.
Storylines to Watch
The Sprint Cup is wrapping up, and being in the Top 10 is vital. While there is a set of enduros to go before the finals, longer races introduce a number of factors such as co-drivers, more strategy variety, fuel saving, and more frequent and longer pit stops. A bad two weeks in the enduros could be mitigated by a good Sprint Cup finish to remain in finals. Ryan Wood and Kai Allen fighting to break into the Top 10, a poor Darwin weekend from Ryan Wood dropped him from P10 in the championship to P11, whereas Kai Allen found himself promoted into P12 after podiums in Darwin. At the bottom of the tree, Anton de Pasquale, Cam Hill, and Andre Heimgartner fighting to keep their spots.
This weekend is the penultimate round of the Repco Sprint Cup. Currently, Broc Feeney is holding onto the Sprint Cup by 183 points, having sealed 5 consecutive race wins in Perth and Darwin, with 8 total wins for the season. Last year, Feeney found himself P7 for both races in Townsville, with Will Brown having an interesting weekend finishing in P3 and P24. Triple Eight/Red Bull Ampol Racing don't have the strongest track record in Townsville, potentially opening the door for others to ruin Feeney's early Sprint Cup win. Feeney has said this weekend he won't be driving for the championship but to "try and win three more races".
With an unfortunate end to his weekend in Chicago, Will Brown is one to watch. It will be interesting how he responds back on Australian soil and how that will be reflected in his racing, especially chasing Feeney for the Sprint Cup. In Chicago, Brown was involved in a multi-car pile-up early in the race from a promising P19 on the grid, and did not resume running. This follows his unfortunate run in Sonoma last year, where throttle and electrical issues reduced a promising start to the weekend to P31.
Tickford are historically strong in Townsville, with Cam Waters running P1 and P2 last year followed by Thomas Randle in P5 for both races. 2023 brought strong results for them as well. Waters swept the opening weekend at Sydney Motorsport Park this year, however has only shown patches of brilliance throughout the rest of the year. This is a testament to the depth and competitiveness of the category, however he is due for another good finish in Townsville.
Matt Payne is strong on street courses, but Penrite Racing also excels at strategy races with race engineer for car 19 Jack Bell calling some effective alternative strategy for longer races. Last year Matt Payne followed up his debut win in Adelaide in 2023 with his second career win here in 2024, due to an alternate strategy call which placed him well. Penrite Racing, especially car 19 will be one to watch this weekend.
Erebus Motorsport have been a bit nowhere this season so far, having recovered to P10 from being last in the teams championship. Last year, Jack le Brocq had a good weekend out, finishing P6 and P4 in each race respectively. That being said, Erebus Motorsport was very different last year and different again from the year prior. It will be interesting to see how they run this weekend, and if they have recovered from seemingly being all at sea.
The championship top ten: Feeney, Brown (-183), Payne (-197), Waters (-320), Mostert (-479), Kostecki (-564), Randle (-639), Heimgartner (-647), Hill (-700), de Pasquale (-714)
Flat Chat Predicts
Our predictions for this weekend!
P1: Matt Payne
P2: Cam Waters
P3: Chaz Mostert
Smokey: Kai Allen