Townsville SuperSprint
The Townsville SuperSprint (formally known as the NTI Townsville SuperSprint) is an annual motor racing event for Supercars, held on the Townsville Street Circuit in Townsville, Queensland, Australia. The event has been held since 2009.[1]
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| Race Information | |
| Venue | Townsville Street Circuit |
| Number of times held | 11 |
| First held | 2009 |
| Race Format | |
| Race 1 | |
| Laps | 70 |
| Distance | 200 km |
| Race 2 | |
| Laps | 70 |
| Distance | 200 km |
| Last Event (2019) | |
| Overall Winner | |
 | Triple Eight Race Engineering |
| Race Winners | |
.svg.png){kind=small} | DJR Team Penske |
| Triple Eight Race Engineering |
Until 2020, the event was held with longer races and was in all but one year known as the Townsville 400. In 2020, two Townsville events will be held under the SuperSprint banner due to calendar changes and shorter races caused by the COVID-19 pandemic[2].
Format
The event is staged over a three-day weekend, from Friday to Sunday. Three thirty-minute practice sessions are held, two on Friday and one on Saturday. Saturday features a twenty-minute qualifying session which decides the grid positions for the following 200 kilometre race. A twenty-minute qualifying session is held on Sunday, succeeded by a top ten shootout, the combined results of which decide the grid for the following 200 km race.[3]
In 2014 only, the event was extended to 500 kilometres overall, with two 125 km races on Saturday and a 250 km race on Sunday.
History
The event was announced in late 2007, following the allocation of funding from both the federal and the Queensland state government.[4] The event became the third Queensland event on the calendar, joining Queensland Raceway in Ipswich and the Surfers Paradise Street Circuit on the Gold Coast. However, Townsville did become the first major motor racing event to be held in the North Queensland region.[4] The event is held in early July each year.
Jamie Whincup won the first race on the circuit in 2009, with James Courtney winning the Sunday race.[5] Whincup would go on to win the Saturday race again in 2010 with Mark Winterbottom this time winning the second race. 2011 and 2012 saw four consecutive wins for Holden, with Whincup winning three more races at the circuit. In 2013, Russell Ingall broke the all time championship event starts record at the event.[6] In the Sunday race, the Holden Racing Team scored a one-two finish with Tander leading home Courtney.[7] They would repeat the one-two finish in the second Saturday race of the 2014 event.[8]
Winterbottom won both races in 2015 to become the only driver other than Whincup, who achieved the feat in 2012, to achieve a clean sweep of the event.[9] In the first ten years of the event, Whincup's record was unsurpassed, winning ten of the twenty-one races held at the track.[10] Only Tander and Winterbottom (three each) and van Gisbergen (two) won multiple races at the circuit up to 2018.
2019 saw the first wet race in the event's history on the Sunday, which eventually saw van Gisbergen prevail after a chaotic race featuring several incidents and a pit lane fire at Brad Jones Racing.[11]
Winners
Multiple winners
By driver
| Race Wins | Driver |
|---|---|
| 10 | |
| 3 | |
| |
| |
| 2 | |
By team
| Race Wins | Team |
|---|---|
| 13 | Triple Eight Race Engineering |
| 4 | Prodrive Racing Australia |
| 3 | Holden Racing Team |
| DJR Team Penske1 |
Event names and sponsors
- 2009: Dunlop Townsville 400
- 2010–13: Sucrogen Townsville 400
- 2014: Castrol Townsville 500 – Driven by TAFE Queensland
- 2015–16: Castrol Edge Townsville 400
- 2017–19: Watpac Townsville 400
- 2020–present: NTI Townsville SuperSprint
References
- Allan Edwards (29 September 2008). "2009 V8 Supercar calendar released". Official site of the Australian V8 Supercar Championship Series. Archived from the original on 17 August 2009. Retrieved 25 February 2013.
- O'Brien, Connor (7 August 2020). "Doubleheader confirmed for Townsville". Supercars. Retrieved 7 August 2020.
- "Supercars Operations Manual 2019 - Division "A" - Administration Rules" (PDF). Supercars. 24 January 2019. Retrieved 7 July 2019.
- Peskett, Karl (14 November 2007). "Townsville to get V8 Supercars street race". Car Advice. Retrieved 8 September 2015.
- Greenhalgh, David; Howard, Graham; Wilson, Stewart (2011). The official history: Australian Touring Car Championship - 50 Years. St Leonards, New South Wales: Chevron Publishing Group. ISBN 978-0-9805912-2-4.
- "Commemorative number for Ingall in Townsville". Speedcafe. 28 June 2013. Retrieved 8 September 2015.
- Bartholomaeus, Stefan (7 July 2013). "HRT emphatically breaks victory drought". Speedcafe. Retrieved 8 September 2015.
- Bartholomaeus, Stefan (5 July 2014). "Tander leads HRT one-two in Race 21". Speedcafe. Retrieved 8 September 2015.
- Bartholomaeus, Stefan (12 July 2015). "Mark Winterbottom takes Townsville double". Speedcafe. Retrieved 8 September 2015.
- Jackson, Ed (7 July 2018). "Whincup reignites title defence after storming to victory in Townsville 400". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 9 July 2018.
- Herrero, Daniel (7 July 2019). "Van Gisbergen wins under Safety Car in Townsville chaos". Speedcafe. Retrieved 7 July 2019.