So now it seems we can head down to the local supermarket and collect a bargain basement V8Supercar, thanks to the cost-cutting measures that all at AVESCO and TEGA have come up with! Well, it's not quite that drastic, but if you believe some of the media reports and scuttlebutt making its way around the now infamous V8Supercar website chat forums, V8Supercar racing will never be the same again.

Some of that is right: V8Supercar racing will never be the same again, from next year on. It should be better. It should be more affordable. It should provide a more level playing field for all teams to compete on. Will the results change? More than likely not. Why? Because the best teams will still be the best teams and do the best job. The idea of cutting the cost of running a V8Supercar team has been lobbied around for some time now. The costs of running a V8Supercar team have been rising for a while too, to a point now, that if something isn't done in the near future, teams will fall off the merry-go-round.

The idea of introducing control components that do not interfere with the outright lap time performance of the cars is a great idea. Why not have a control wheel, sourced from one supplier, at a reduced rate because the supplier knows that they have a large customer base. The cars will not be any slower because they have the same wheels on them, will they? Brake callipers, discs and pads are also items that can be made "control" and will not change the lap time dramatically. There are only 3 or 4 brands of brake calliper and each is nearly as good as another, so making them "control" and applying the same practical business sense, makes sense!

There are many more items that TEGA has identified as components that would not slow the cars down, nor change the spectacle of V8Supercar racing, but when purchased in bulk, would drastically reduce the cost of componentry. Another aspect of the now famous TEGA document for cost-cutting is reducing the aerodynamic effect of the front splitters and rear wings. This is where I start to get a little confused. I would have thought that these two things, cost-cutting and aero, would be two distinct and separate items. If we were to reduce the aero, teams would be investing in all sorts of new technology to gain any sort of advantage over their competition - how is that cost -cutting? It's a bit like the testing rules that we currently have. Reducing the teams to have only 6 test days means that most teams have invested in hugely expensive simulation software to do all the on track testing "virtually" through this software. This software can cost from $150,000 to $180,000. That's a lot of test days!

I, along with almost everyone in pit lane, understand that some form of cost-cutting has to take place to ensure that V8Supercar racing continues to be the force that it is in the sporting arena. We are all too aware of the BTCC saga that took place in the late 1990s, almost wiping out Super Touring altogether, leaving it a skeleton of its former self. TEGA and AVESCO just need to make sure that they make the right decisions, for all involved, as this could be the most important crossroads that V8Supercars have come across since their inception. - Garth