Next weekend the teams will be competing at The Bend circuit in South Australia for the first of two consecutive weekends of racing at the privately-owned multi-million dollar facility.

There are a number of different circuit configurations available with the Supercars using their normal layout for next weekend, but then the following weekend they will use a different layout they have never raced on before.

Each of the six races over the two weekends is worth 100 points to the winners before the grand finale at Bathurst for the Supercheap 1000 on October 15 to 18.

That will prove a critical race as the winner bags 300 points which will have a major impact on who wins the championship and the coveted Peter Brock trophy.

Going into next weekend two-time champion Scott McLaughlin is on top of the point score with 1834 points in his Ford Mustang from seven-time champion Jamie Whincup, 143 points behind in his Holden Commodore.

Chas Mostert is a further 301 points behind in his Commodore with Cam Waters another 21 points behind in his Mustang and Shane Van Gisbergen just 12 points back in his Commodore.

The five drivers are covered by a total of 477 points which is just over half the available points.

Aside from the drivers' championship there is fierce competition between the teams to finish on top in the teams' championship point score, as the winning team is allocated the pit garages at the exit end of pit lane for the next year.

With all races requiring mandatory pit stops it is a major advantage for the number one team to exit their pit bay without having to fight to get back into the fast lane and then move onto the track.

There have been many occasions when cars further down pit lane have been impeded or made contact with another car on exit and been penalised.

The teams' title is currently led by the Red Bull Holden Race Team on 3048 points with the incumbent Shell/V Power Team just 42 points behind.

With drivers Whincup and Van Gisbergen the RBHRT is the best combination to score team points, whereas McLaughlin is a bit of a lone ranger with team mate Fabian Coulthard not providing the required backup.

As we saw in the previous round the Commodore drivers worked well together to gang up on McLaughlin who had no backup from Coulthard and was really fighting with one hand tied behind his back.

The Racing Point F1 team confirmed on Thursday that Sergio Perez would not be part of the team for the next two years despite having a contract through to the end of 2022.

The 30-year-old Mexican driver has been dumped to accommodate four-time world champion Sebastian Vettel who will finish with Ferrari at the end of the season.

Vettel will line up next year with Lance Stroll whose billionaire father Laurence owns the Racing Point team that is to be renamed Aston Martin from 2021.

Perez has been extremely loyal to the team for seven years to the extent that in 2018, when the team was known as Force India, he secured millions of dollars in funding to save the team from extinction.

There are few options available for Perez in 2021 and his disappointment is obvious from later comments.

He does understand that a father will always favour a son but it is still a bitter pill to swallow.

I had a seniors' moment in last week's column, telling readers that the weekend's Italian GP at Monza would be the 1000th race for the Ferrari F1 team. Silly me.

In fact it will be this weekend at Mugello and the cars will appear in a special livery first used by Ferrari in the early days of their competition history.