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Australia
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Supercars set to investigate more night races

Supercars will look into expanding its portfolio of night time races, following a successful return to under lights action in Sydney on Saturday night.

Podium: race winner Shane van Gisbergen, Triple Eight Race Engineering Holden, second place Jamie Whincup, Triple Eight Race Engineering Holden, third place Scott McLaughlin, DJR Team Penske Ford

Podium: race winner Shane van Gisbergen, Triple Eight Race Engineering Holden, second place Jamie Whincup, Triple Eight Race Engineering Holden, third place Scott McLaughlin, DJR Team Penske Ford

Dirk Klynsmith / Motorsport Images

The first night race on Australian soil in 20 years proved a hit for the series, which has reported a crowd of 21,220 for the 300-kilometre race alone – 50 per cent up on any single-day crowd from the 2017 Sydney Motorsport Park event.

The two-day crowd was close to 33,000, while TV audiences were up 73 per cent for Friday's prime time practice session, and 17 per cent up compared to Saturday's race in 2017.

Based on those numbers – as well as a swell of positive feedback from people in the paddock – Supercars has confirmed that the concept is set to return to Sydney next year, along with plans to investigate implementing it at other rounds.

“It would be remiss of us to not look at applying the model to other races,” CEO Sean Seamer told the series' official website.

“The television and events teams have done a really good job with the mobile lighting, so there’s nothing to suggest the lighting can’t go to other race tracks in Australia.

“What those races are yet, we haven’t had the discussion, but there are certainly a lot of learnings we can take from the weekend."

Seamer did admit that there was move to room with the concept, scheduling changes and a re-think of the single-race 300-kilometre format the key points raised by paddock insiders over the weekend.

“We’ll do a full debrief during the week with the teams to make sure we’ve got the scheduling right, in terms of where we slot in,” said Seamer.

“We are motorsport fundamentally but we are also entertainment and we need to look at all ways we can make our sport more accessible and digestible for more people.

“That is not just night racing, there are other ways we can do that, including racing in the twilight.”

Twilight racing is understood to be one of the key draw-cards for a potential switch to a summer series. That's not necessarily a short-term prospect, however, with the Adelaide 500 and Australian Grand Prix having already locked down March dates for next year.

Supercars is currently working on its 2019 schedule, which is expected to be confirmed in late September.

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Edition

Australia