Cara Jenkin: The only race left cannot be confirmed, so SA is at risk of not having one

The government heard the deafening chorus from people who have no clue about motorsport and now SA fans get nothing at all, maybe forever, writes Cara Jenkin.

A very powerful message was sent in the hours leading up to the Bathurst 1000 on Sunday – the Adelaide 500 can’t just move to The Bend.

There is nothing in the Australian constitution, the motorsport manual or general laws to live by that says top-tier motorsport events must be held in South Australia. And Supercars the organisation may well be considering payback to the state government for pulling the rug out from under it when it cancelled the Adelaide 500 street race late last year.

Supercars wants to be a national sport, don’t get me wrong, and would prefer to have a race in SA, alongside its other events scheduled for every other state, the Northern Territory, and New Zealand in 2022, than none at all.

But when Supercars released its draft calendar in the hours before its biggest race of the year on Sunday there was a glaring omission. No event has yet been locked in for SA.

There is one round TBC, on the last weekend of July, with discussions said to be underway with more than one circuit provider, one of which is The Bend Motorsport Park. Why contracts have not been signed for The Bend next year may well be because of that date.

Crowds watching the Supercars at The Bend in May this year. Picture: Brenton Edwards

It is wet and cold in July in SA. It’s hard enough to get more than a couple of thousand people to sit rugged up at a SANFL game in the suburbs at that time of year, never mind drive over an hour to a racetrack to stand around all day in inclement weather.

An event held in autumn or spring is much preferred by the track owners to maximise the crowd in attendance.

It wasn’t that long ago that spring at The Bend also was preferred by Supercars. Last year, the venue was supposed to hold a much-anticipated enduro race, that would feature a longer race distance, co-drivers and a lot of hype and excitement, leading into the pinnacle Bathurst 1000 event.

If it had not been killed by a Covid-19-interrupted season, it would have been one of the key highlights on the Supercars calendar.

So what happened to see The Bend offered a dreary midwinter spot on the calendar next year instead of prime time?

The chorus from people who have no clue about, nor any interest in, motorsport to “just move the Adelaide 500 to The Bend”, now that a new motorsport complex had been built an hour’s drive from the CBD, had finally deafened the ears of the state government.

Interest in Supercars was dwindling, the government had said. Attendance at motorsport events was dwindling, it said. The sport had a new permanent facility in the vast open spaces of the Murraylands, so why have two Supercars rounds each year in SA when there could just be one?

Adelaide 500 race one winner Jamie Whincup celebrates after his win in 2020. Picture: Daniel Kalisz/Getty Images

So it stopped funding the Adelaide 500, told Supercars it was not interested in holding the street race in future, but it was more than welcome to continue coming to SA to race at The Bend.

Supercars, naturally, was peeved. Not only was its biggest event of its calendar in terms of attendance scrapped, it was being told it was a sport on the nose of South Australians. The government was spruiking that it was not worth the $14m it spent funding the event, which it thought would be better to spread around other community events.

Yet, a year on from the decision to can the Adelaide 500, no one knows what other events are being put on – or even are under consideration by the state government – to replace the event.

The only Supercars race we have left cannot be confirmed, so we are at risk of not having one at all.

Every person I talked to while sitting around the television at my neighbourhood’s Bathurst 1000 party on Sunday said they would prefer to watch Supercars at the Adelaide 500 than at The Bend.

But they would want to go watch a Supercars race at The Bend rather than not at all.