The 2017 Supercars Championship (formally known as the 2017 Virgin Australia Supercars Championship) will be an FIA-sanctioned international motor racing series for Supercars, which prior to July 2016 had been known as V8 Supercars. It will be the nineteenth running of the Supercars Championship and the twenty-first series in which Supercars have contested the premier Australian touring car title. Shane van Gisbergen will start the season as the defending drivers' champion with is team, Triple Eight Race Engineering, defending teams' champions.
The 2017 season will see the category undergo a substantial revision of its technical regulations, with the introduction of Gen 2 Supercar rules which will open the championship up to a wider range of body shapes and engine configurations.
Teams and drivers
Holden and Nissan will be represented by factory-backed teams.
The following drivers are currently under contract for 2017.
Jason Bright will move his Britek Motorsport Racing Entitlement Contract (REC) from Brad Jones Racing to Prodrive Racing Australia.
Super Black Racing closed at the end of 2016, with its REC sold to Prodrive Racing Australia co-owner, Rusty French, who on-sold it to Tim Blanchard Racing.
Triple Eight Race Engineering will become the official Holden factory team. Walkinshaw Racing, which competed as the factory Holden Racing Team from 1990 to 2016, will become a customer Holden team instead.
Volvo withdrew from the series at the end of the 2016 season. Garry Rogers Motorsport returned to using Holden Commodores, as it had done prior to switching to Volvo in 2014.
Jason Bright will move from Brad Jones Racing to Prodrive Racing Australia, for whom he drove in 2005 and 2006, racing under his Britek Motorsport REC.
Matt Chahda was scheduled to make his Supercars début with Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport, but his application for a racing licence was refused by the Confederation of Australian Motor Sport.
Shae Davies left Erebus Motorsport to return to the Dunlop Super2 Series.
Simona de Silvestro will join the championship with Nissan Motorsport. Having contested the 2015 and 2016 Bathurst 1000 events, De Silvestro will be the first female driver to contest the full championship since Melinda Price and Kerryn Brewer in 1998.
Scott McLaughlin will move from Garry Rogers Motorsport to DJR Team Penske.
Nick Percat will move from Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport to Brad Jones Racing.
Chris Pither lost his seat at Super Black Racing after the team closed, he will return as an endurance race co-driver with Erebus Motorsport.
Scott Pye will move from DJR Team Penske to Walkinshaw Racing.
Alex Rullo will become the youngest Supercars driver in the series' history when he makes his début for Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport.
Garth Tander will move from Walkinshaw Racing to Garry Rogers Motorsport, having previously driven for the team between 1998 and 2004.
Dale Wood will move from Nissan Motorsport to Erebus Motorsport, replacing Shae Davies.
The following fourteen events are scheduled to take place in 2017:
The Sydney 500—which was held at the Homebush Street Circuit from 2009 to 2016—will be replaced by a new event, the Newcastle 500. The round will be held on a street circuit in the East End of Newcastle, and will be run to the SuperStreet format, featuring two races of 250 kilometres.
The KL City 400 at the Kuala Lumpur Street Circuit in Malaysia is contracted to host an event on the calendar from 2017 to 2019. The running of the event is pending the resolution of legal issues which cancelled the 2016 event, and it was omitted from the 2017 calendar.
Two international rounds to be held at the Sentul Circuit in Indonesia and a street circuit near Bangkok in Thailand were initially included on a draft of the season calendar, but were later deferred until the 2018 season, with a demonstration event planned for Thailand in the interim.
The Adelaide 500 will return to its original format of two races of 250 kilometres, which was last used in 2013. Event organisers cited the unpopularity of the format used between 2014 and 2016—two races of 125 km followed by one 250 km race—as the reason for the change. The top ten shootout will also be re-introduced for qualifying for the Saturday race.
The Phillip Island 500 will consist of two races of 250 km.
The Auckland SuperSprint will adopt a new format, with its four 100 km races being replaced with two races of 200 km, and will include mandatory pit stops.
The 2017 season will see the introduction of Gen 2 Supercar regulations. Two-door coupé body styles will be permitted alongside four-door sedans, while the engine regulations will be opened up to include turbocharged four or six-cylinder engines. However, cars will still be required to be based on front-engined, rear wheel drive, four-seater production cars that are sold in Australia. The chassis and control components will be carried over from the New Generation V8 Supercar regulations used since 2013. However all teams will continue to use New Generation specification cars until the beginning of 2018 when Triple Eight Race Engineering will debut the Holden Commodore (NG) built to the new specifications.
Two new control Dunlop tyres will be introduced, marking the first change in tyre construction since 2003. Whereas in previous seasons, the two compounds were designated hard and soft, in 2017 these will be named soft and super soft respectively. All teams attended a test session on 21 February 2017 at Sydney Motorsport Park to evaluate the new tyre.
Starting in 2017, drivers must earn a racing licence sanctioned by the Confederation of Australian Motorsport (CAMS) in order to be eligible to compete in the category. The licence system will be structured similarly to the Superlicence used in Formula One, with drivers earning points towards their licence by placing in feeder series accredited by CAMS.
Teams from Supercars' support category, the Dunlop Super2 Series will be allowed to compete as wildcards in the main series in five rounds of the 2017 season, at Barbagallo, Winton, Hidden Valley, Ipswich and Bathurst. The 250km race held specifically for the Super2 Series at Bathurst will also become a non-championship round, to encourage more applicants.
