Team TRTPower Rankings: Sydney Under Lights
Buckle up – if this is what Supercars 2025 has to offer, we are absolutely here for it…
Here is everything that was HOT, NOT and WHAT from the season opener at Sydney Motorsport Park.
ABOUT THE RANKINGS: The TRT Power Rankings are compiled by your nominations from social media and edited by the TRT editorial team. They’re designed to give a balanced, as fair as possible critical overview of those things that excelled and those things that struggled, at each event. It’s (mostly) a democracy, and what you nominate generates the order, so have your say next event via our social media channels, @theracetorque on Facebook, Twitter and Insta. Look for the call out each evening and get commenting!
HOT
1. THAT Race 2 Finish and the way it was managed
QUITE SIMPLY the best Supercars race of the Gen3 era and probably of the last decade. It had plenty of plot twists throughout, with strategy (good and bad) playing out – and then the last six laps happened, and they’re among the best of all time. The finish was remarkable, from the tap in the final corner to the side draft and even the director’s choice to take the entire thing from the superb chopper camera. Cudos to race control for letting it play out as it did and not getting in the way with stupid penalties that would have sucked the wind out of Supercars finest moment in ages. A breathtaking race, an even better finish and the kind of stuff you get out of bed for in the morning.
2. Cam Waters
By far and away his best ever and most complete weekend performance in his Supercars career. Waters has had some fine performances before, but he has never strung together a weekend as crushingly well as that one. It will be scary for his opposition, too, because if this 2025-spec Waters lasts through to September and October, one finals-season performance like that will probably win him the championship. As dominant a weekend as they come.
3. Race 3
The first half was pretty tame, but then the weather played a role, and the stakes increased as a result. Some of the car control on display was breathtaking – Brodie Kostecki was one example – and it added a serious twist to the end. Waters won, but the show was also a winner in the end.
4. Chaz Mostert
Shootout issue aside, a 100th championship podium for Chaz and a consistently competitive performance bodes well for him to challenge for that championship this season finally. Bonus points for his continually amusing banter with the commentators after his qualifying laps.
5. Will Brown
Though Broc’s role in Saturday’s race probably garnered more headlines, the fact the champ strung together a fifth, third and second to sit third in points was an effective weekend when it was clear no one was probably going to beat a) a Mustang and b) Cam Waters. Also, Triple Eight were clearly the best Chevy team by miles all weekend.
6. Matthew Payne
He was already the de facto team leader for Grove’s anyway, but they needed to step up this year with rookie Kai Allen alongside him. Did so and was competitive throughout.
7. Broc Feeney
Solid as a rock and in the fight on Saturday night the Feen drove his heart out and was only pipped to a win by three hundredths. Had to put an early market in the fascinating inter-team fight with Will Brown for Red Bull supremacy in what is going to be one of the most compelling sub-plots of the 2025 championship story, and did that. And he’s such a good chat, too.
8. Thomas Randle
Third in the opener was a staunch launch into 2025.
9. Anton De Pasquale
Team Charlie has been looking for a driver who can just go and bash out a supremely consistent weekend like Anton’s, so this was a good result. Absolutely rock solid and while he never looked like winning, few others did either, so to come away with his position in the points and with a clearly competitive package is a win – especially as the GM teams squabble over who gets to be the next Triple Eight.
10. Brodie Kostecki
A positive debut in DJR land with the impact of his shift – and the engineering strength that came with – being felt almost instantly, especially with how they tuned up their cars for Sunday after a lacklustre Saturday performance. That, if anything, bodes well for the team in this new era.
Sydney Motorsport Park & The Event
NO race track we’ve been to in the world changes character so much from day to night as SMP. It was atmospheric and outstanding on Saturday night with a good crowd in attendance and warm summer breezes coming from a direction other than the dump. The engagement from the crowd in the closing moments was sensational and all-in-all the circuit deserves a tick for it’s night racing product, as does Supercars.
The post-race pit party was a brilliant idea, extremely well attended, and gave the Saturday night show a major-event vibe. It was a very good execution of a very good day—if only it was the full stop on the event…
Super2
DIDN’T go full Super2 on the weekend and instead put on the appearances of a very good racing category. Great field, with depth and unpredictability built in.
Jaxon Evans
Best weekend in a long time for Jaxon and the Saturday night performance in particular was very worthy of working into the HOT list.
BRT Bounceback Saturday
From nowhere to 11th (Courtney) and 16th (Love) was commendable. Courtney leaves SMP 12th in the points.
Race 1
A definite highlight was the race to the finish, with Thomas Randle jagging third, passing Matt Payne on the final circuit.
Fuel Churns
A bit of old school cool, and a different element added into the mix of things that can go wrong in the pits.
Chopper Cam
Chopper cam always makes an event feel more significant than perhaps it is – but it was surprisingly effective at SMP, especially when the lights were turned out. Perhaps it’s because you can’t see the rest of Western Sydney around it. Its application in the Saturday night finish was absolutely perfect.
V8 SuperUtes
Four winners from four races and some of the standard biff ‘n barge made this a solid opener for the now fully subscribed Utes.
Harri Jones
Gave a very competitive Carrera Cup field an absolute smoking on the weekend. Like, it wasn’t even close. It might be one-make Porsche racing, but Harri is in a GT2RS compared to everyone else’s Boxters at the moment.
TCM
Not quite as ridiculously good as last year’s Sydney round, but TCM still turned on a good show at the weekend. Joel Heinrich was ace, Jude Bargs in the Commodore is a good addition and with more cars supposedly coming on stream, it could be a solid year for the popular category.
Speedway Cross Promotion
If this is the norm for Supercars events now then we’re here for it. It was a reasonably well-executed cross-promotion attempt with Cooper Murray and TV’s Chad Neylon driving sprint cars and Cam Waters cutting laps in his Mustang, which all anyone could then think about was when the first Supercars-on-dirt show would happen – because it would be awesome. Sydney Speedway has had a shocking introduction to life but a willingness to embrace cross promotional events like this will help rebuild its reputation somewhat.
WHAT
Brodie’s Team Switch
Ouch
Post-Race What?
Shocking
NOT
1. Blanchard Racing Team
Outlap madness. Ugly and unnecessary. Added on top of Love’s brake failure on the test day, it was a tough start to 2025 for a squad that is looking to improve.
2. PremiAir Racing
It was a tough, tough week. Firstly, James Golding nearly burned to the ground on the test day. The two cars had a shocker in race one. Golding was punted off at the start of race two, and Richie Stanaway’s Chevy expired shortly thereafter. Golding scored a ninth and an eighth from the final two races, while Stanaway leaves Sydney last in the points with the only DNF of any driver from the event.
3. Cooper Murray’s Sunday
What was all that about? Messy, and ultimately penalised.
4. David Reynolds
SMP and Reynolds do not get along. Results of 15th, 22nd and 22nd leave him 22nd in the standings.
5. Tickford’s Saturday Strategy
Note: this should be hot, because without it, we would have never got THAT finish, with Waters charging through late.
6. Macauley Jones
Nearly a huge mess, and was rightly penalised for this qualifying blunder.
7. Feeney’s Flat
Tough break early in the season.
8. Friday Night Crowd/Format
While three races was a win, and only one practice was a win as well, there’s still progress and learnings to be had from the weekend. Saturday was a great success, but Friday was – let’s be honest, here – poorly attended and was very expensive for a 24-lap, half-point race. Make it $20 to get in after work, jam qualifying and the race in within a few hours and you might get a better result.
And then there’s the biggest issue with the Saturday night races which is.. Sunday.
A 10:30PM finish – once concerts were done – was followed by an early start on Sunday to turn around and go racing again and it just doesn’t work. Three races in three days is great, but you could make it even sharper with a Friday night race followed by a Saturday late arvo and a Saturday night show, then everyone can go home – even if it means running supports on Thursday if needed. Sunday felt like a very long day that was an addition to the Saturday night show, and not part of the same event – and while the crowd wasn’t sparse, it wasn’t anywhere near what Saturday delivered either.
And also, no Supercars race should ever be held at SMP in the daytime again. The lights are there, they are superb: use them.
9. Chaz’s Shootout Faux Pas
Rebounded to score a podium on Sunday, but life would have been so much easier had he just started up the front.
10. MSR Pit Fail
The first significant blunder was the new fuel churn.
Fullwood’s Lack of Wets
For a team famous for bold strategic calls you feel like there was opportunity lost on Sunday for the Middy’s car.
Ryan Wood’s Stall
It was a costly start to race two, and a 20th place effort resulted.
Marcus Zukanovic
One of the good guys in the sport comes away with big damage to the big Falcon. Perhaps it’s time to roll out the Mustang they’ve been talking about building.
Other Biffo
Punters at the Test Day
A lot of gripes regarding the lack of access granted to punters on the test day. Maybe just keep the gates locked next time if they aren’t being catered to?
8min Qualifying
A tough session length to get two runs in at SMP – Will Brown just managed it, but he was pitted at the pit exit – others down the lane would have struggled. It probably deserves to be massaged, depending on the relative track lengths.
TV Graphics
New year, same old round one issues.
Track PA
This is a problem that rests on the ARDC and it’s one that we get NOT nominations for at every single major event the circuit hosts. From insufficient coverage to the PA working and then cutting out for minutes on end, or it not being loud enough, this is a basic spectator amenity that shouldn’t be hard to get right. You can’t see all of SMP from a lot of the vantage points, nor the big screens – so having a working PA is important. Time to fix this, mainly so we stop getting tens of notes about it every time we put out a rankings call for an SMP-based event.
SOCIALS
Ugh
Subtitles by Sponsorship
Thanks, Dunlop
Highly likely
Slingshot Engaged
Facts
