Walkinshaw team principal Carl Faux to join Jimmie Johnson's NASCAR team after Bathurst farewell

Faux confirms Legacy Motor Club role

Outgoing Walkinshaw TW Racing team principal Carl Faux has confirmed a move to NASCAR, taking up a role as principal performance engineer with Toyota squad Legacy Motor Club, the organisation co-owned by seven-time Cup Series champion Jimmie Johnson. Speedcafe revealed in July that Faux would leave the team after the Bathurst 1000, at which point his next career move was unclear; he has now detailed the appointment and will relocate from Melbourne to North Carolina next month, after nine years based in Australia. ¹

The connection arose through Toyota Racing Development, Faux told Speedcafe. During a December wind tunnel test in the United States for the Toyota GR Supra Supercar project, he visited both of TRD's bases at Costa Mesa and Salisbury, where the east coast facility run by Andy Graves assisted Walkinshaw with 3D printing and other work. Graves visited the team's Melbourne workshop in January, and in June introduced Faux to Legacy Motor Club, whose race weekend at Sonoma he attended before the team made its offer. ¹

EssentiallySports, drawing on V8 Sleuth reporting, describes the Sonoma visit and a subsequent tour of the team's workshop as what Faux called "an extended interview effectively", allowing both sides to assess the fit before Legacy made its offer. The appointment sits within a broader personnel reshaping ahead of the planned 2027 expansion from two to three full-time Cup entries, which has also seen Michael Guttilla named president in April after his time as chief operating officer at Joe Gibbs Racing. ³

Why the move appealed

Faux's explanation for the switch centres on the working environment. "The politics of this is something that I don't want to experience again... I'm much more cold, hard facts and black-and-white," he told V8 Sleuth, arguing that a championship built on technical parity should be governed by technical criteria. "Being able to do a good job and not be penalised for doing a good job is quite appealing for me," he said, as reported by EssentiallySports. ³

His comments come after a period of public debate over technical regulations in Supercars. In March 2026, Triple Eight boss Jamie Whincup questioned the legality of Walkinshaw chassis, alleging that two older cars built in 2022-23 had been TIG-welded where the regulations required MIG welding. EssentiallySports reports that the dispute concerned those older chassis rather than the new Toyota Supra, that Walkinshaw co-owner Ryan Walkinshaw responded the original construction had been permitted before the rules changed, and that Supercars motorsport boss Tim Edwards clarified the issue involved cars no longer being raced. EssentiallySports notes Faux has not identified that dispute as the reason for his departure. ³

Faux has also spoken about the demands of the equalised formula. "You've had to do all this work to get to just the same place as everyone else," he told V8 Sleuth in 2025, according to EssentiallySports, describing how meeting Supercars' parity requirements meant some design iterations did not lead towards more performance. In NASCAR, he does not expect the same scope for design changes, but told V8 Sleuth the fundamentals remain familiar: "At the end of the day, the physics doesn't change. You have still got an engine, you have still got four wheels and tyres, you have still got a gearbox, and you are still trying to win races as often as possible." ³

Nine years rebuilding Walkinshaw

Faux arrived in Australia in the latter stages of the 2017 Supercars season with a background in the British Touring Car Championship, joining the team as a technical consultant before becoming technical director and then team principal in late 2023, according to EssentiallySports. Over that period the organisation rebuilt itself into a championship-winning operation, claiming the Bathurst 1000 in 2021 and the 2025 drivers' title with Chaz Mostert. ³

Among the highlights Faux cites from his time at Walkinshaw are an underrated podium at the 2019 Bathurst 1000 for James Courtney and Jack Perkins, a critical role in the discovery and development of Ryan Wood, and the deployment of the Supra, which proved a winner in just its third event, Speedcafe reports. He also points to the team's cultural transformation: "When I first came here, the team too easily dropped the lip, blame was rife and the culture was poor," he told Speedcafe, contrasting that with a team he says now shows resilience and support for one another. "It is the people inside the team that I am proudest of most." ¹

The Toyota project that shaped his final seasons

Faux's tenure culminated in Walkinshaw's move to become Toyota's homologation team. For the 2026 season the outfit was renamed Walkinshaw TW Racing after United Autosports' exit, racing the GR Supra with Mostert and Ryan Wood, who are both contracted to at least 2028, with ownership shared by Ryan Walkinshaw, Dan Towriss's TW Motorsports and, from March 2026, Scott O'Donnell's ODFI. The team's history runs back to the Holden Racing Team, founded in 1990, with drivers' titles in 1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001 and 2002 plus a teams' championship in 2009, and Mostert and Lee Holdsworth's 2021 victory the most recent of its eight Bathurst 1000 wins. ²

The development of the GR Supra was one of the defining technical projects of Faux's time at Walkinshaw. EssentiallySports reports the team had to adapt the car's bodywork to the Gen3 platform and develop a race-ready version of Toyota's 2UR-GSE V8, with changes to the engine's fuel-injection system, valve timing and capacity, and a finished package required to meet performance, reliability and cost targets. Faux also had responsibility for the homologation duties for Toyota, designing the body and the engine, as he told Speedcafe. ³¹

The December 2025 wind tunnel programme that seeded his NASCAR connection was itself part of the parity effort: EssentiallySports reports that engineers from Supercars' rival manufacturers worked in a North Carolina wind tunnel testing the Toyota GR Supra, Ford Mustang and Chevrolet Camaro, with the task of bringing the three models closer to aerodynamic parity, in a test Supercars reported in December 2025. ³

A bittersweet farewell

Faux acknowledges the decision is bittersweet after a successful nine-year stint building both a career and a life in Australia. "It was an aspiration to come and be part of this championship, because it is the best touring car championship in the world, hands down," he told Speedcafe. "Will I miss Australia? Of course, it's the place I've called home for nine years. My youngest son has spent more time in Australia than he has in England. So this is a huge thing for us. And Australia will always be close to my heart, the country and the people." ¹

The move takes him to unfamiliar territory. Faux told Speedcafe he has not particularly followed NASCAR and does not have a great understanding of it, but sees the lack of preconceived ideas as an advantage. Just as his 2017 relocation was a huge move for his family, he says wrapping his head around a different way of doing things again is something he still wants to do, applying what he knows to another series while seeing what that series can teach him. ¹

Legacy Motor Club, for its part, is preparing for growth beyond the addition of an entry. EssentiallySports reports Johnson has made clear the expansion is about building the workforce and improving the overall operation, and that Josh Berry is set to take over the No. 42 Toyota in 2027 while Riley Herbst is expected to drive the new No. 84 entry. EssentiallySports suggests Faux's experience across touring cars, engineering and team management should give the organisation another perspective as it pursues that goal. ³