Marcos Ambrose Joins AASA as National Competition Director — and He's Coming Out Swinging
The two-time Supercars champion has taken on a newly created role with a clear mandate: make Australian motorsport more professional, more affordable, and more exciting.
Australian motorsport has a new voice at the table — and it's one of the most recognisable in the country.
Marcos Ambrose, the two-time Supercars champion who went on to spend nine years in NASCAR before returning to Australia, has been appointed as AASA's National Competition and Commercial Director. The role is newly created, and Ambrose wasted no time spelling out what he intends to do with it.
"My role is to support the transition of AASA from a grass roots racing/heritage type product into a professional, dynamic, trusted and proven alternative for national level motorsport in Australia," he said. "AASA is fully committed to making racing more affordable, more rewarding and more meaningful for both local racers and national stars."
AASA CEO Stephen Whyte was effusive in welcoming the appointment. "Marcos and I have been talking for some time and it's quite clear he has a focus on the competitor and the future of motorsport in this country," Whyte said. "He wants to make a difference. His clear pedigree aside, he knows what it takes to go racing at any level."
Ambrose came up through Formula Ford — his father Ross co-founded Van Diemen International with Ralph Firman Sr — and has never lost sight of what it means to be a grass-roots racer trying to make it. That perspective shapes everything he's doing at AASA. "We joke at AASA that we are here to put the 'race' back in racing or the 'sport' back in motorsport," he said. "But really, it's not a joke at all — that's our mission."
Changes were already coming before the announcement was even official. Ambrose had been working with AASA for months, and competitors were already noticing a shift in energy. The biggest reforms — lap-count racing and rolling starts — would be revealed within weeks.