A SECOND Supercars event at Mount Panorama will help Bathurst generate some of the income it lost with the cancellation of major motor sport events in 2020.
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Over the weekend, leading Australian motor sport magazine Auto Action published details of the provisional schedule it had obtained, revealing two events for Mount Panorama next year.
For the first time a Supercars season is set to open at Mount Panorama, with the Bathurst 500 pencilled in for February 26-28.
The exact format of that event is yet to be confirmed, but is expected to feature twin 250 kilometre sprint races.
Supercars chief executive officer Sean Seamer had hinted that the Mount would host the 2021 season opener in his address after this year's Bathurst 1000.
"I wish everybody a good time, get home, get home safely, and enjoy some down time with your families and we'll get back here to Bathurst in February," he said.
Mount Panorama will also host the Bathurst 1000 in 2021 and the leaked schedule has it remaining in its traditional timeslot - it will run October 7-10.
A second Supercars event has been made possible due to the cancellation of the 2021 Bathurst 12 Hour.
"They knew they couldn't get the international competitors out. They'd have to leave now basically, their cars have to be loaded into containers on ships now to get here in time and of course there's still COVID in Europe - it's going gangbusters - so they wouldn't be allowed out," councillor Warren Aubin said.
"It wasn't worth it, so they've canned the 12 Hour, which always opened up that weekend for the Supercars."
Due to the pandemic, the 2020 Bathurst 6 Hour and the inaugural Bathurst International were both cancelled, leaving the local economy without the boost it would receive from those events.
There was also a limited crowd at the Bathurst 1000 in October, which cost the city and other nearby regional communities millions of dollars.
Cr Aubin said local businesses have to take advantage of the new Supercars event when it comes to Bathurst in February.
"Council runs these events and draws the crowds; it's up to businesses to take advantage of that," he said.
"Council and Supercars can't make people go and shop in people's shops, so business have to take advantage of there being thousands of people in the city and on their doorstep and find ways of getting them to come spend money with them."
He also hopes there will be some community engagement events to support the race meeting, as the ones normally on the schedule for the Bathurst 1000 had to be cancelled in October.