{"id":368388,"date":"2024-02-17T03:04:08","date_gmt":"2024-02-17T04:04:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=368388"},"modified":"2024-02-17T05:02:52","modified_gmt":"2024-02-17T05:02:52","slug":"why-supercars-legend-resisted-american-dream","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=368388","title":{"rendered":"Why Supercars legend resisted American dream"},"content":{"rendered":"

Seven-time Supercars<\/a> champion Jamie Whincup<\/a> has revealed the simple reason he didn't chase opportunities to race overseas.<\/p>\n

Whincup retired from full-time driving at the end of the 2021 season, handing the reins of his No.88 car to Broc Feeney.<\/p>\n

Whincup is statistically the Supercars GOAT. Along with his seven championships, he won 125 races \u2013 including four Bathurst 1000<\/a>s \u2013 and took pole 92 times.<\/p>\n

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READ MORE:<\/strong> Team boss accused of $1.25m cover-up amid F1 crisis<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<\/p>\n

READ MORE: \ufeff<\/strong>How Usain Bolt boosted Aussie towards world title<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Whincup won six of his titles between 2008-14. Given his domination of the sport, detractors have criticised Whincup for not trying his hand overseas, as Scott McLaughlin<\/a> and now Shane van Gisbergen<\/a> have done.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Speaking to Wide World of Sports, Whincup said the reason was simple.<\/p>\n

"There were pros and cons to both staying in Australia and to moving over and try my luck in the big pond," he said.<\/p>\n

"For me, there was one thing that tipped the point to stay in Australia, and that was I'm an Australian, I love this great country, I didn't want to leave Australia (and) I didn't want to live in the US.\u00a0<\/p>\n

"I just wanted to live in Australia, and that was the main reason why I decided to stay."<\/p>\n

Whincup said he actively sat down and weighed up chasing the overseas dream before deciding against it.<\/p>\n

"Opportunities don't just present themselves in any sport \u2013 you've gotta go there and actively chase it.\u00a0<\/p>\n

"I believe I could've if I did chase it, I believe I would have created an opportunity for myself but I decided not to."<\/p>\n

Now the team principal of the Triple Eight team he won each of his titles with, Whincup signed Will Brown to replace the NASCAR-bound Shane van Gisbergen. He believes they make up the most exciting driver lineup on the grid.<\/p>\n

But should they come to him with a desire to follow McLaughlin and SVG overseas, he's not going to stand in their way.<\/p>\n

\"Jamie<\/p>\n

"We don't bring drivers on just to do a job internally, and that's it," Whincup said.<\/p>\n

"We like to boost people's careers, and we want to make sure they are better people on and off the race track after they've done a stint at Triple Eight.\u00a0<\/p>\n

"Of course the selfish thing would be to hang on to our skilled staff for as long as possible, but at the same time if someone comes to me and says, 'hey, I've got this opportunity, I wanna do something else' then we're certainly going to help them along the way."<\/p>\n

Van Gisbergen's departure from the team to the US was orchestrated largely by the Kiwi himself, amid a broader dissatisfaction with the sport.<\/p>\n

\"Whincup<\/p>\n

Whincup said Supercars has been growing as an international talent pool for the better part of the last decade.<\/p>\n

"I think the further on we go and the more established Supercars becomes, the more it's getting recognised as a highly competitive world class competition," he said.<\/p>\n

"The better Scotty Mac goes, the better SVG goes \u2013 SVG won on debut in the main series of NASCAR in Chicago last year \u2013 Supercars grows on the map.<\/p>\n

"I think any driver that gets a Supercars opportunity should be very grateful."<\/p>\n

Whincup said it was only a matter of time before another Supercars gun went abroad.<\/p>\n

\"Triple<\/p>\n

"If Scotty and SVG can make the switch, there's absolutely no reason why more can't," he said.<\/p>\n

"If I was a young kid driving a kart, I'd be busting like you wouldn't believe trying to get into Supercars. One, to get into the premier category here in Australia, but now there's an extra element where it could (lead to) an opportunity to drive in other categories around the world."<\/p>\n

Whincup is back in action this weekend, driving the No.88 Mercedes AMG in the Bathurst 12 Hour. Brown and Feeney will also be in action in the sister No.888 car.<\/p>\n

Practice for the Supercars season-opening Bathurst 500 gets underway next Friday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Seven-time Supercars champion Jamie Whincup has revealed the simple reason he didn't chase opportunities to race overseas. Whincup retired from full-time driving at the end […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":368390,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368388"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=368388"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368388\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":368395,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368388\/revisions\/368395"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/368390"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=368388"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=368388"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=368388"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}