RNW Staff

The Christmas break is over: Next Saturday (January 18), Formula E will enter the third in a total of 14 races this season in Santiago de Chile. After having clinched its first trophy on the opening weekend of the fully electric racing series in November, the Audi Sport ABT Schaeffler team with its two drivers Daniel Abt and Lucas di Grassi is again setting its sights on scoring podium finishes.

Team Hong Kong Craft-Bamboo Racing’s line-up made up of Hong Kong athletes Jonathan Hui, Antares Au, Frank Yu and Kevin Tse had high expectations going into the 2020 Dubai 24 Hours, given their previous successes at the desert endurance race. Running a historic black and gold Mercedes-AMG livery, the team started the weekend from a strong position after a mega lap in qualifying by Jon Hui. Hui’s effort put the #69 Mercedes-AMG GT3 in 18th overall and 7th in the GT3-AM class, only 1.7 seconds off the overall pole position.

The Black Falcon Mercedes-AMG GT3 with starting number 4 and drivers Khaled Al Qubaisi from the UAE, Ben Barker from the UK, Hubert Haupt and Manuel Metzger from Germany and Jeroen Bleekemolen from The Netherlands was confirmed as the winner of the 15th edition of the Hankook 24H DUBAI. For the first time in the event’s history, the full duration couldn’t be completed. Heavy rainfall and standing water prompted race control to red-flag the race after 7h17m. In spite of the best efforts by the staff and officials of Dubai Autodrome, continuing rainfall throughout the night and the morning prevented any further action. It was decided not to continue the race for safety reasons, a decision fully accepted and unanimously applauded by everyone in the paddock and pit lane.

At 15.00 hrs local time, His Highness Sheikh Juma Bin Maktoum Al Maktoum waved the flag of the United Arab Emirates to send the 65-car field underway for the 15th running of the Hankook 24H DUBAI. Once again, the original endurance race in the Gulf region serves as the season opener of the 24H SERIES powered by Hankook and has attracted a packed field of GTs and touring cars featuring teams and drivers from all over the world.

British racer Jann Mardenborough will contest his fifth consecutive full-time season in Japan in 2020 after being announced as part of Nissan’s driver roster for the Super GT sportscar championship.

POMONA, CA – January 9, 2020 – (Motor Sports NewsWire) –  The NHRA Mello Yello Drag Racing Series starts its 2020 season in memorable fashion, as the annual iconic opener, the Lucas Oil NHRA Winternationals presented by ProtectTheHarvest.com, will celebrate its 60th rendition Feb. 6-9 at Auto Club Raceway at Pomona. The tradition-rich event is […]

Tristan Vautier will complete JDC-Miller MotorSports lineup in the No. 85 Cadillac DPi-V.R for this month’s IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season-opening Rolex 24 at Daytona.

German Maro Engel, a former winner of the FIA GT World Cup, hadn’t raced at Dubai Autodrome since 2017, but that didn’t prevent him from claiming the outright pole position for this week’s 15th running of the Hankook 24H DUBAI. A lap time of 1m57.490s at the 5.390km long Dubai Autodrome was enough for Engel to secure pole position with the Toksport WRT Mercedes-AMG GT3 (#777, Maro Engel / Luca Stolz / Philip Ellis / Patrick Assenheimer / Martin Konrad). It was also the first pole position for Mercedes-AMG in the Hankook 24H DUBAI since 2017.

K-PAX Racing has announced Thursday its continued presence in the GT World Challenge America series, fielding one of its second-generation Bentley Continental GT3s in the series’ featured Pro-Am division.

The legendary BMW Junior Team celebrates its comeback after more than 40 years. Eddie Cheever (USA), Manfred Winkelhock (GER) and Marc Surer (SUI) caused a stir in the world of motorsport in 1977, and 2020 will see a new generation of promising talents contest races under the name BMW Junior Team. Dan Harper (GBR), Max Hesse (GER) and Neil Verhagen (USA) will complete a holistic, first-class, intensive training programme designed to cover two seasons that will set new standards in the promotion of young talented drivers. One of their mentors will be the man who founded the first BMW Junior Team in 1977: Jochen Neerpasch.

Bentley Motorsport’s 2020 programme is set to be its largest yet, with elite customer teams competing in the world’s leading GT3 championships and its works-supported Bentley Team M-Sport outfit entering the highest level of GT3 competition in the Intercontinental GT Challenge (IGTC).

K-PAX Racing announced Wednesday its entry in the 2020 GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup, which marks the perennial title contender’s first full-season stint outside of the United States. The team’s participation in the series’ five-round Endurance Cup features a two-car effort with the second-generation Bentley Continental GT3.

The Customer Racing programme having been founded in 2010, the performance and sports car brand from Affalterbach is meanwhile taking on its tenth season of GT racing. The legendary gullwing, the SLS AMG GT3, already enjoyed early maiden success in its debut season and enthused teams, drivers and fans with its unmistakable design and sound in equal measure. From 2016 and 2018 onwards, the respective successors with the Mercedes-AMG GT3 and the Mercedes-AMG GT4 raised the bar for success even higher. In 2019, the Customer Racing teams seamlessly continued from the record season 2018 and celebrated over 40 championship wins. In the process, titles in renowned race series such as the Blancpain GT Series, VLN Langstreckenmeisterschaft Nürburgring and not least victory in the FIA GT World Cup at Macau once again underlined Mercedes-AMG Customer Racing’s ambition to dominate in the GT segment.

Lamborghini Squadra Corse presented the Factory Drivers for the 2020 season, including reconfirmed members and two new arrivals. Giacomo Altoé and Albert Costa have been inducted into the ranks of official drivers, joining Andrea Caldarelli and Marco Mapelli (2019 Blancpain GT Series champions), Dennis Lind, Franck Perera, and Giovanni Venturini.

Aston Martin Racing will attack the GTE classes of the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2020 with three ultra-competitive line-ups, after announcing British endurance aces Harry Tincknell and Richard Westbrook will complete its GTE Pro roster for this year’s French classic.

Absolute Racing have confirmed Yuan Bo and Leo Ye Hongli as their first GT World Challenge Asia driver pairing for 2020.

Lamborghini will contest the Intercontinental GT Challenge Powered by Pirelli full-time in 2020 after confirming a five-round programme spearheaded by ORANGE1 FFF Racing Team by ACM.

New IMSA WeatherTech Sports Car Championship team Era Motorsport has just completed the first full-series test of the season, the Roar Before the 24. With eight sessions over the course of the three days, the team made massive strides with their new Oreca LMP2 07 with drivers Kyle Tilley, Dwight Merriman, Ryan Lewis, and Nicolas Minassian.

The 2020 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season got off to a successful start for Porsche Motorsport factory and customer programs with the annual ROAR Before the Rolex 24 at Daytona International Speedway, January 3 – 5. At the end of three days of testing and qualifying sessions for both the factory-entered Porsche 911 RSR-19 and customer-prepared Porsche 911 GT3 R race cars, all left the Florida test with a positive outlook for the upcoming Rolex 24 At Daytona on January 25 – 26.

Paul Miller Racing has completed it’s IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship pre-season preparation with an impressive test at the Roar Before the 24 at Daytona International Speedway.