What Brown, Feeney need to do to win the championship in Adelaide

By this time next week, Will Brown could have clinched the 2024 Repco Supercars Championship title, but not if Broc Feeney has anything to do with it.

Brown leads Triple Eight Race Engineering teammate Feeney by 180 points, with a maximum of 150 on offer in each of the two races at the VAILO Adelaide 500.

Feeney is an outside chance of the title, and has to put distance on Brown in Saturday’s Race 23 of the season to keep his hopes alive.

The numbers

There will be 300 points on the line at Adelaide over two races, worth 150 points each. That means the highest Feeney could get to is 2892 points with two race victories — an entirely possible outcome given his brilliant form in Adelaide.

But with Brown sitting on 2772 points heading into Adelaide, it means he just needs to score 121 points to guarantee his maiden championship.

The key number for Brown is 14. If the Toowoomba-born driver finishes 14th in both races in Adelaide, Brown will score 126 points — enough to grab him the title. A finish of 14th and 15th will get him 123 points, which is also enough.

Feeney will be hoping Brown isn’t able to finish at least one of the races, but even if Brown crashed out of Saturday's race, he could finish third on Sunday and secure the title.

This is all assuming Feeney can win both races in Adelaide. If Feeney stumbles, the task becomes easier for Brown, who has overwhelming weight of numbers behind him.

How Feeney keeps the championship alive on Saturday

Feeney, who won the 2022 Adelaide 500 and finished second last year, could be hard to stop at the iconic South Australian event.

Feeney needs to claw back 30 or more points on Brown in Saturday’s race to take it to Sunday, and crucially, leads the first tie-break of number of race wins – five to four.

If Brown leads by 150 points heading into Sunday, Feeney has to win the race and hope Brown fails to finish.

If Feeney wins on Saturday, he can’t afford for Brown to finish any higher than fourth. If Brown finishes in seventh, Feeney can’t afford to finish any lower than third.

How Feeney can keep title alive after Saturday race

How Brown might clinch the championship on Sunday

If Feeney does the bare minimum on Saturday, then the #88 driver needs to win on Sunday and hope Brown suffers a DNF. Both Triple Eight drivers have finished every race this year, so Feeney will need his teammate to trip up in a major way.

Brown has a remarkable podium record – 17 times out of 22 so far, and a podium at every single round – and outside of his lap 1 incident in Townsville, has finished every race in ninth or better.

Because Feeney leads the wins tie-break, Brown can’t get by on two 15th place finishes, which gets him 120 points for the round. If Feeney wins both races and gets 300 points, they will end the year level on 2892 points, but Feeney would win the title on countback.

If Feeney wins Race 23 and Brown finishes fourth, the latter need only finish 24th (and last) on the following day.

Brown and Feeney will commence their quests to clinch the 2024 Repco Supercars Championship at the VAILO Adelaide 500 on Thursday November 14. Tickets are on sale now.