New Ferrari Team Aiming for Hampton Downs Debut

Zagame Autosport has outlined aspirations to graduate to GT World Challenge Australia powered by AWS next season with a Ferrari 296 GT3, which could debut as early as this year’s season finale at Hampton Downs in early November.

The current Monochrome GT4 Australia Series team is in line to become the second to run the ultra-successful 296 GT3 in the Australian series after Arise Racing GT, which won the title last year and leads this year’s standings at the halfway point.

Zagame has already been out testing its new Ferrari at Winton Motor Raceway and has plans for further outings prior to the Hampton Downs event on Oct. 31-Nov. 2, which would precede a full-time campaign in 2026.

“It was always the plan to roll out a car in the middle of the year as we wanted to understand the Ferrari properly,” said team general manager Rod Wilson.

“It’s no secret that the Ferrari is one of the most complicated cars on the grid in terms of operation systems and preparation, so we wanted to make sure we had enough of the right knowledge, the right people and the correct tooling before we got it on track.

“We tested the car for the first time at Winton recently, it all worked seamlessly well and everything went to plan. We’ll squeeze in some extra testing post-June, so we’d like to do a back-to-back test at The Bend and at Phillip Island if weather permits.

“I hope by the time we get to Hampton Downs, we will well and truly be over understanding the car in addition to operating the program at a high level.

“We’re certainly not turning up to waffle around at the back of the grid.”

The driver lineup for the Zagame Ferrari is already confirmed, with TCR Australia champion Josh Buchan lined up to partner Bronze-ranked Cameron Campbell.

Buchan is already known to the team, having driven its McLaren Artura GT4 in the Monochrome GT4 Australia Series since last season alongside Jason Yu.

Wilson described Campbell, whose background is in the Ferrari Challenge Australasia series, as “quite outstanding” in terms of raw speed, adding that he and Buchan will make a “formidable Pro-Am driver lineup” despite neither having GT3 experience.