V8 SUPERCAR STALWART Cameron McConville has announced he will retire from driving full time at the end of the season after a 10 year career in Australia’s leading motorsport category.
Following a frightening crash at Phillip Island, which saw the Holden driver catapult across the track backwards and narrowly avoid clashing with oncoming cars, speculation has mounted that McConville may hang up his helmet at season’s end.
But according to the 35-year-old, it wasn’t the incident at the first endurance race of the season that prompted his decision to quit the V8 scene.
McConville said he realised his motivation was beginning to fade after a horrid round at the Gold Coast SuperGP, where a huge crash during the opening lap of race two destroyed his race weekend.
“Phillip Island, if anything, motivated me, it made me committed to have a good go at Bathurst and I suppose standing up there on the podium I thought, if anything, this is a good way to finish off,” he told AAP.
“But once Indy came around I just didn’t enjoy it, even the racing on the Saturday where I finished 18th.
“I had no brakes, the heat was unbearable and then I got stuck in the wall and I thought right, my motivation for this is waning a bit.”
Meanwhile, the V8 circus moves back to Phillip Island this weekend for the hastily arranged Island 300, a replacement for Bahrain’s Desert 400 which was pulled from the calendar following a restructure of the 2010 schedule.
With the V8 Supercar series set to open with back-to-back Middle Eastern rounds next year, series organisers, in conjunction with the Bahrain circuit agreed to scrap the 2009 event, forcing AVESCO to search for a replacement circuit.
Although a usual supercar weekend takes place over three days and sees a plethora of support categories share track time, for the Island 300, all activities will be condensed into a two-day format.
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Falcon/Commodore is equivalent to Falcodore or Commocon.
Neither has any resemblance the road going equivalent and the formula is both flatulant and very dated. At best it is low demand entertainment for those with an IQ of below 100.
Good on McConville leaving the formula. He displays behaviour of that associated with having an IQ above 100
Cameron McConville has been in the motor racing game for a long time.
The V8 Supercar series has been his career for a decade.
It sounds more likely that his decision to retire has been made with somewhat more gravity than Will would imply with his rather odd assertion of an IQ cutoff point.
We all understand that the series has been distilled down to the point where the supposed Holden/Ford rivalry is now meaningless.
In our experience the fans fully understand this and remain enthusiastic because they admire the drivers and have a great understanding of strategies the teams employ as they try to gain small advantages in this very tight formula.
Maybe we will see more of Cameron on TV ?
I find the whole V8 thing has become quite boring to watch, probably because the cars no longer reesmble anything available on the road. Actually I find those little funny replica cars more entertaining, about the size of a mini, can’t remember what they’re called.
Best of luck Cam. You’re a great ambassador for the sport and have had some good successes over the years. All the best.
@Will. Name me a major racing series that really reflects what the punters drive. The closest I suspect you’ll find is the BTCC and that formula was tried here some years ago if you’ll recall. Didn’t go too well did it?
Don’t get me wrong, V8SC is far from perfect but at least it’s not NASCAR where the cars are identical except for the stickers and bear absolutely no resemblance to the road versions. At least in V8SC, both road and race versions are RWD, available with V8 engines and use factory bodyshells.
Sad to see Cam leave the series, he has been around along time and is one of the better drivers and media guys going around. Looking forward to see him more on the F1 show..
Best of luck Cameron. You ahve shown us some great racing over the years
@ The Dog:
Try the Australian Touring Car Championship…