Sprint Cup Season to Open With 29 Cars at Brands Hatch

The new Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe powered by AWS Sprint Cup season will open this weekend with a 29-car field at Brands Hatch.

A total of 15 entries are registered in the Pro class, with five in Gold Cup and nine in Silver Cup. The Bronze Cup class is not racing at Brands Hatch due to space limitations but will join from round two at Misano where more than 40 cars are expected.

Reigning Sprint Cup champions Dries Vanthoor and Charles Weerts are back in search of a fourth consecutive title with Team WRT, sharing a BMW M4 GT3 rather than the Audi R8 LMS GT3 Evo II that they campaigned previously.

The BMW factory duo is one of three all-Platinum pairings at Brands Hatch after series organizer SRO Motorsports Group freed the Pro class from any driver rating restrictions.

Last season, Pro lineups could only have one Platinum driver but that requirement is no longer in place.

The other all-Platinum pairings are Mattia Drudi and Ricardo Feller in the Tresor Orange 1 Audi, and Lamborghini factory drivers Jordan Pepper and Franck Perera who are representing Vincenzo Sospiri Racing.

Raffaele Marciello and Timur Boguslavskiy, who won the second race at Brands Hatch last season, are back in the No. 88 Akkodis ASP Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo.

That is the only Mercedes-AMG in the top category, as the cars from Haupt Racing Team and Madpanda Motorsport are running in Silver Cup.

Five Audis are competing in Pro, including two each for Sainteloc Junior Team and Comtoyou Racing which also have a Gold Cup presence.

Former Lamborghini outfit Emil Frey Racing is returning to Sprint Cup and bringing its new manufacturer Ferrari back to the top category for the first time since 2016, courtesy of its two Ferrari 296 GT3s.

Garage 59, the only British team at Brands, and JP Motorsport are fielding a McLaren 720S GT3 Evo each, while Dinamic GT is bringing a Type-992 Porsche 911 GT3 R.

The Pro entry is completed by the WRT BMWs for Valentino Rossi and Maxime Martin, and reigning GTWC Europe Endurance Cup Silver champions Thomas Neubauer and Jean-Baptiste Simmenauer.

The Gold Cup, which carries a maximum driver combination of one Gold and one Silver this season, includes two Audis from Boutsen VDS and a further BMW from WRT.

All-Silver pairings will compete for Silver Cup honors. The category includes Honda’s maiden Sprint Cup appearance courtesy of Nova Race, and a Ferrari 488 GT3 Evo 2020 from AF Corse which claimed an overall victory at Brands Hatch last year.

AF Corse has altered its Silver Cup crew after Ulysse de Pauw and Pierre-Alexandre Jean — both now rated Gold — won last season’s class title, with Sean Hudspeth and Nicola Marinangeli now lining up for the Italian squad.

Silver Cup also has two Lamborghinis for VSR and one for GSM, as well as the Madpanda Motorsport Mercedes-AMG and an Audi from Tresor Attempto Racing.

Free Practice, Pre-Qualifying and qualifying for the Sprint Cup season-opener take place on Saturday, followed by both 60-minute races on Sunday.

The first session for GTWC Europe starts at 9 a.m. local time (4 a.m. ET) on Saturday.