K-PAX to Take One-Year Hiatus from Racing

Photo: SRO

K-PAX Racing will take a hiatus from sports car racing next year, with the Jim Haughey-owned operation planning a return to GT3 competition in 2025.

The California-based squad, which switched from Fanatec GT World Challenge America powered by AWS to Fanatec GT Europe this year with a Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2, endured a challenging season in Endurance Cup, with multiple issues, largely out of the control of the team that dashed hopes of top results.

The only points scored by the Marco Mapelli, Sandy Mitchell and Franck Perera-driven Pro class entry came at the penultimate round of the season at the Nürburgring, where they finished ninth.

With its three-year contract with Lamborghini up at the end of this year, it has allowed the team to take a step back and re-asses the GT3 racing landscape moving forward according to program manager Darren Law.

“Because our contract with Lamborghini ended and it’s fairly late in the season, we’ve not put together a program involving another manufacturer for 2024; we haven’t had the time to get that together,” Law told Sportscar365.

“We’re going to take 2024 off and re-structure and work to put together a program together in 2025.

“It’s important that we have a good relationship with a manufacturer program. We’re working on it.

“There are multiple new cars, from Aston to Corvette to Mustang and I know Mercedes is working on a new car too, so there’s a lot of choices.

“It wouldn’t be bad to sit back and see how things progress through part of ’24 before we make a decision.

“It’s important to not walk into something we don’t feel will be beneficial for our program.”

Law added: “If you look at how K-PAX has worked, since we got involved with Jim, we had McLaren for three years, we had Bentley for three years and we had Lamborghini for three years.

“Jim is not one to just jump in and do a one-off season. It’a a multi-year program he’s looking for.”

Law said the priority would likely be to remain in Fanatec GT Europe in 2025, although Haughey hasn’t closed the door to other options.

“It’s still to be determined but Jim has a very big interest in running in Europe,” he explained. “He enjoys the time over there and the competition.

“That doesn’t mean that’s the only choice but that’s the priority right now at this point.”

With Law’s group also managing Flying Lizard Motorsports, the majority of the K-PAX crew will remain employed, although in different programs next year.

“What’s really good with the tie-in to Flying Lizard is that we’ve got multiple programs for 2024,” Law said.

“We have a place for most of the guys and any of the key members that we had that I can’t place, K-PAX is going to keep them on a retainer and make sure we still have them in place for the next program.”

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