Ben Croke has taken over the role of team principal at Dick Johnson Racing, with Ryan Story becoming the team’s new chairman and CEO.
The defending team’s champions revealed the look of its all-new technical structure this afternoon.
Having spent the last five seasons with the Ford outfit after stints at Erebus Motorsport and Stone Brothers Racing, Croke moves up from his position as team manager.
Story, who played a pivotal role in the team’s success with the Ford Mustang, moves from team principal and managing director to chairman and CEO.
“Dick [Johnson] and I are very proud owners of his eponymous racing team, and in taking on the chairman and CEO roles, it’s not dissimilar to what I’ve been doing in years past since 2013,” Story said.
But it does change some of the responsibilities for the day-to-day operations of the race team itself.
“In Ben Croke, we have a guy who’s been involved in motor racing not just here in Australia in Supercars, but in Europe as well. He’s got an immense amount of experience, and he’s been with us for a long time. I think that now is the right time for him to step up.”
The other noteworthy move if Ludo Lacroix becoming Anton de Pasquale’s engineer for the full 2021 season. It marks a return to a race engineer role for the technical wizard after a two-year break where he acted as the team’s competition director.
Scott McLaughlin’s former race engineer Richard Harris will work with Will Davison.
“The roles of Ludo Lacroix (competition director) and Nick Hughes (technical director) remain unchanged,” added Story.
“In terms of our engineering lineup for next year, we look forward to having Ludo engineering Anton De Pasquale and taking on a young driver similar to when he first joined our team in 2017 alongside Scott McLaughlin.
“Richard Harris will step up to a race engineering role to run Will Davison’s Shell V-Power Racing Team Mustang.”
The 2021 Supercars season is slated to kick off with the Mount Panorama 500 on February 27-28.