By Tarek Ramchani
Down under, the 2013 Australian GT Championship season will kick off next weekend at Bathurst. Round 1 of the series will be shared with Bathurst 12 Hour endurance event. No less than seven Audi R8 LMS and ultra cars have been entered for Mount Panorama enduro event. In total five R8 LMS ultra and two R8 LMS. The Aussie based Audi squads will be represented by four cars with massive support from Melbourne Performance Center. Two new R8 LMS ultra specification cars for both Rod Salmon and Mark Eddy/Marc Cini. Both Peter Conroy Motorsport and Minda Motorsport will have older specification R8 LMS cars.
In the last couple of years the series has had positive growth with a great quality field and some big names joining in selected events. During 2011 Audi took the overall drivers championship title with Mark Eddy in his R8 LMS, we hope that the 2013 season will bring the title to the Inglostadt brand again. 2013 will have six rounds across Australia with the finale set in New Zealand. The series will have Pirelli as the new and exclusive tire supplier.
Here is a quick look the four Aussie based R16 teams along with the drivers line-ups of each car for the Bathurst 12 Hour race. As of yet the full season entries are to be confirmed, but rest assured that Audi will be well represented.
Peter Conroy Motorsport
Car: #14 Audi R8 LMS
Drivers: Peter Conroy/Rob Huff/James Winslow
Rod Salmon
Car: #6 Audi R8 LMS ultra
Drivers: Rod Salmon/Craig Lowndes/Warren Luff
Mark Eddy/Marc Cini
Car: #9 Audi R8 LMS ultra
Drivers: Mark Eddy/Marc Cini/Dean Grant/Christopher Mies
Car: #71 Audi R8 LMS
Drivers: Dean Koutsoumidis/Andrew McInnes/Simon Middleton/Darryl O’Young
2013 Australian GT Championship calendar
Round 1: Feb 8-10 Bathurst 12-hour
Round 2: Feb 28-Mar 3, Clipsal 500, Adelaide
Round 3: May 24-26 Phillip Island
Round 4: July 12-14 Sydney Motorsport Park
Round 5: Aug 2-4 Queensland Raceway
Round 6: Nov 8-10 Highlands Motorsport Park, NZ
Photo credit and more information:
Melbourne Performance Center official Facebook
No comments:
Post a Comment