Shane Howard will depart as CEO of Supercars after leading the organization since January 2022.

He will take on a newly-created role within Race Australia Consolidated Enterprises RACE as Director – Motorsport, where he will focus on the strategic evolution of Supercars, including overseeing Toyota’s integration in 2026, engaging with motorsport bodies, and supporting international expansion.

The role will also include a director position on the RACE Board.

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Supercars has begun its search for a new CEO, with Howard continuing in the role until a successor is found.

“The demands of motorsport continue to grow, requiring an increasing level of focus and strategic direction. After more than three years as CEO, I believe now is the right time to transition into a role that allows me to focus on the sporting and technical side, which has always been my passion.” Howard explained.

“Shane’s contribution to Supercars as CEO has been outstanding, and his expertise will remain invaluable as we continue to grow the sport.” RACE chairman Barclay Nettlefold explained.

“We thank him for his leadership as CEO and look forward to his continued impact in this new capacity.”

The timing of Howard’s move follows the departure of COO Tim Watsford, who announced last month he would take on the CEO role at St George Illawarra NRL club, leaving two key executive positions to be filled at Supercars.

Both Mostert and Brown struggled in the final qualifying session of the weekend, being both 18th and 24th respectively prior to the incident.

While on a lap, in attempt to move up the grid, Mostert was forced to jump on the brakes, to avoid the slow moving Red Bull, forcing to abandon his run.

“I just stuffed up those first two laps and had to go for a third run, and unfortunately my mate Will Brown out there,” explained Mostert.

“It’s not completely Will’s fault; we rely on communication a lot from our team, and obviously Will had no idea I was on a lap.”

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Besides from this hiccup, the reigning Supercars Champion has had a solid weekend and will be looking at continuing that streak with race 6 taking place this afternoon.

Brown will start alongside teammate and pole sitter Broc Feeney for this afternoon’s race.

Apart from the casualty of a duck, Broc Feeney has started Day 1 of the Australian Grand Prix weekend in the best way possible, taking pole in both qualifying sessions and the opening race of the weekend.

It was also a dream start for the Red Bull Ampol Racing team with Will Brown finishing off a 1-2 for the team.

Another dream was achieved today for Matt Stone Racing’s Cameron Hill who secured his maiden podium with a third place finish. Congratulations to Cam. Let’s hope it is not his only podium for the weekend as he will start tomorrow’s race one spot better in P2.

It was on for until the end for 4th place as Brodie Kostecki managed to hold off a fast finishing Ryan Wood who was really impressive coming from 17th on the grid to gain 11 spots.

Gaining 11 spots sounds great but championship leader managed to do some damage control on his points lead as Cam Waters began the race in 22nd position to finish in 6th place, gaining 16 positions. Cam managed to one again win in a drag race to the line, as he passed the Dewalt Camero in Anton De Pasquale on the line, Anton finished 7th.

In 8th place was Thomas Randle, who started the race in 21st, just in front of teammate Cam Waters. Randle also managed to avoid all the mid pack carnage to gain 13 spots.

Unfortunately it was a what could have been for Matt Payne who managed to come home in 9th position, but he had the pace to finish on the podium but late race pace fell dramatically and lost 5 positions in the stages of the race.

Rounding out the Top 10 was Chaz Mostert who also had a difficult outing, he was running in 6th place but lost multiple positions in a battle that involved at least 8 cars and he fell to the back of the pack due to bad luck and could only manage to recover to 10th position.

The race saw its fair share of action, despite there being no pitstops, all drivers were fighting for every positions with battles even at the rear of the field as rookies Aaron Cameron and Kai Allen fought for the minor positions. Macauley Jones was also apart of this battle that saw Allen in the wall at the final corner and Jones forcing Cameron into the gravel at turn 3 which caused the only safety car of the race.

After the restart, all the battles kicked off which saw James Golding hit the apex tyre bundle at Turn 12, damaging his car and forced to retire the car.

Unfortunately, James Courtney’s car was unable to be fixed for Race 1 from his crash in Practice 2, hopefully the car will be ready for Race 2 tomorrow.

The action continues tomorrow as Supercars will take to the grid at 2:45pm local time for Race 2.

Race 1 results below;