New Zealand veteran Greg Murphy says he's not ready to give away full-time racing after signing on for another year in V8 Supercars.
The four-time Bathurst champion revealed he will remain in his Holden Commodore for the 2012 season, ending speculation for another 12 months the 39-year-old was about to be forced out of the championship.
And Murphy said the decision to stay with the Kelly Racing-backed outfit for 2012 was one he jumped at.
"Staying in the championship is not as easy as it used to be," Murphy said.
"It's great to have the support of the team again and be able to have two seasons in the same car and the same team.
"It makes a huge difference. There's a lot of room for improvement and having the chance to have another crack at it in 2012 is going to give us the chance to make the gains and improvements we need to and get a little bit of consistency."
Murphy has wound back the clock at times in 2011, particularly when he secured pole position at Mount Panorama in October.
But despite the positives Murphy goes into this weekend's season-ending Sydney 500 in 13th position on the championship ladder and he knows he's running out of opportunities to race at the front of the field.
"I wasn't going to go through being a mid-pack runner again," Murphy said.
"We're working towards being a top 10 runner and that's an achievement in itself these days, just to be consistently inside the top 10.
"That's what it is all about. If you know you're going to be just running around in mid-pack then I've got no interest in that whatsoever, I want to be competitive."
AAP