The decision to close the team behind Penrite Racing SBK – formerly GTR MotoStars – didn’t come easy for owner Heath Griffin, but with both Max Stauffer and Cameron Dunker’s futures all but locked in, the high profile independent effort won’t continue into the 2025 season.
Griffin – a former national level racer himself – formed the team in 2020 with Stauffer and Archie McDonald, before later bringing Dunker in for 2021 as a development-type platform competing within the lower tiers of ASBK competition.
While Stauffer graduated to the Superbike ranks for 2022 under the guidance of his dad Jamie Stauffer – the 2006 and 2007 ASBK champion with Yamaha Racing Team – and Griffin to begin learning the ropes in the premier class, Dunker won both the national Supersport 300 and R3 Cup categories with GTR.
Image: Foremost Media.
As a rookie in 2023, the talented teenager Dunker won the Supersport title in his first attempt, while at the top end of town, Stauffer managed to break through for a first Superbike podium at Phillip Island’s penultimate round.
A union with Deon Coote’s title-winning ER Motorsport team – which had split with Honda following Troy Herfoss’ decision to embark on an international career – for 2024 then saw Dunker join close friend Stauffer on YZF-R1M machinery, rebranded as Penrite Racing SBK after Coote had brought in the Australian-owned oil company as title sponsor. His arrival also saw additional personnel added, including decorated technician Paul Free, while on Dunker’s side of the garage he was partnered with former racer Glen Richards.
The team’s presence increased significantly, with Stauffer eventually claiming a career-best fourth in the final standings and 16-year-old Dunker finishing seventh. Both will be beginning new chapters from 2025, however, with Stauffer, 20, heavily linked to a seat at YRT alongside Mike Jones following Cru Halliday’s departure, while Dunker has already been announced at MotoGo Yamaha with new Supersport champion JJ Nahlous. Still, it’s unclear if both deals are set in stone.
For Griffin, the realities of running a top-level ASBK Superbike operation have taken a toll in recent years in between his own family commitments and running a business from day-to-day, and with the underlying goal of helping to firmly establish the careers of Stauffer and Dunker, his time is now up as a team owner in the sport. From the outside, it never really was clear just how the Griffin/Coote partnership was in fact operating as one behind the scenes, which makes the abrupt end after a single term together even more of a head-scratcher.
“We’re not continuing for next year,” Griffin told CycleOnline. “It’s been a hectic workload with two riders on Superbikes and I’ve got my own kids just starting high school and they’re playing rep sports on their own, so just the amount of workload on me for this season has been unsustainable.
“It’s been building for a while and I know it seems as though we’ve been ramping up, but the fact is that my goal was always to get Max and Cam into a situation where they can have professional racing careers. After that, I could take a break, and that’s always been the plan.
Image: Foremost Media.
“I spoke to those guys probably three months ago and said I was not intending to run a team next year and that we should start looking for alternatives for them in 2025, which I have been doing. They are both looking like they’re going to have good, competitive team rides for next season.
“Both will be continuing in Superbike for next year in a competitive situation. It’s been taking too much time from my business and family, and in order for us to take another step forward for next year I would have pretty much had to double that. That just wasn’t possible.”
As for Coote, he has indicated that the intention is to continue in the paddock for 2025, complete with ongoing Penrite support. Speculation that Honda will be back on the grid in an official capacity appears unfounded at this point, while Coote is yet to confirm if he has plans to rebuild a proper ER Motorsport team or if he’s going to partner an existing organisation for the second time in as many years. Both options, he says, are on the table.