Relocated Blancpain Sprint Event at Moscow Raceway Confirmed

Photo: SRO

SRO Motorsports Group and Moscow City Racing have officially confirmed the relocation of the Russian round of the Blancpain Sprint Series to Moscow Raceway, with a formal press conference having been held Tuesday in Moscow.

The event, originally scheduled to be held on the streets around Moscow University, was moved to Russia’s first international-grade circuit due to last minute construction work around the planned site.

ENTRY LIST: Moscow Raceway

It’s resulted in a compact two-day event on July 3-4, with a 22-car provisional entry for the championship’s first trip to Russia.

Additional entries for the fourth round of the season include three SMP Racing Ferrari 458 Italias, including one for Mikhail Aleshin and Andrea Bertolini, who is coming off GTE-Am class victory with the Russian squad in last weekend’s 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Nissan GT Academy Team RJN will also field a car for its Russian GT Academy winner Mark Shulzhitskiy and a to-be-announced co-driver.

“We are very happy to be back in Russia, for the first time with the Blancpain Sprint Series,” said SRO Motorsports Group CEO and founder Stephane Ratel.

“For the event we have two Russian teams on the entry list, GT Russian Team with Mercedes and SMP Racing with Ferrari, and there will be at least six Russian drivers taking on the best GT drivers in the world.

“Russia is very important for us and we hope to build a strong relationship.”

Aleshin and Shulzhitskiy were joined by Ratel,  Tom Sauer, head of Blancpain Sprint Series project in Moscow, Ekaterina Beltsevich, Head of Moscow Raceway race track, Sergey Ivanov, Executive Director of the Russian Automobile Federation (RAF) and GT Russian Team driver Alexey Karachev at today’s press conference.

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John