Tigani Adds Trophy Class Porsche for Youlden, Halstead

Tigani Motorsport will field a Trophy class Porsche 911 GT3 R in the full GT World Challenge Australia powered by AWS season for Luke Youlden and Nathan Halstead.

Former Bathurst 1000 winner Youlden and Halstead will share the Type-991.1 Porsche, understood to be an ex-GTWC Asia chassis, for the six-round campaign after making a one-off outing in last year’s Queensland round.

The news also means Porsche will have full-time representation on the grid this year, if not with the latest generation of machinery.

“The 2026 GT World Challenge Australia powered by AWS season marks the first full time campaign in any series for me since 2022 — so excited is the word,” said Youlden.

“I’ve missed the competition and opportunity to sink my teeth into a full year and really get comfortable in the car.

“The opportunity to work with and coach Nathan is what keeps me coming back. We’ve talked about doing this together for some time and the series provides a unique opportunity to not only coach but to also drive.

“We go into this season looking to win the class. I think we’ll also surprise a few in Pro-Am if some things go our way.

“Even through the car is a little older, it will be close in performance to the newer models judging by how well we mixed it with the heavyweights at Queensland last year.”

Halstead added it was an “easy” decision to commit to the full season and echoed Youlden’s desire to give the Pro-Am entries a run for their money.

“I have been preparing for the season in advance and will continue throughout the season to improve, so I expect to be competitive with other Trophy cars and Luke may even give the Pro-Am cars a real challenge,” he said.

“I have improved substantially in the last 12-24 months with Luke as my guide. Luke knows the Porsche and is getting me to understand the car and its aero better every time I drive it.

“At the start of the season I will be trying to settle into the car and the GT racing environment. Once settled I’ll be aiming for class wins or at least top two and finally to achieve a consistent year throughout all 12 races.”

Tigani is already confirmed to be running a Pro-Am Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo in this year’s GTWC Australia campaign for Brendon Leitch and Sergio Pires.

The new season is due to kick off at Phillip Island on March 27-29.