Introduction Quick points on GT races @ Sonoma Raceway GT races at Sonoma seem to go well despite prior issues with the circuit being repaved and testing/practice sessions being canceled due to the circuit needing to be fixed Westin Workman scores podium in TGR Cup Samantha Tan and Neil Verhagan get P2 in GT Challenge America GT World Challenge Europe @ Circuit Paul Ricard Good race or no? → Good race in my opinion Notable moments from the race Mustang GT3 has rear bodywork issues again Aston Martin catches fire #32 BMW DNF after collision with Ferrari and getting a puncture, puncture caused the bodywork to get shredded up (Charles Weerts at the scene of the crime AGAIN) #98 BMW bungles strategy → Did not get enough fuel in the car the first time around and ended up having to pit again Nürburgring Langstrecken Series (NLS) Interesting faces participating in this series this weekend Glickenhaus Kamui Kobayashi Jimmy Broadbent and Steve Brown (won in their class in Race 2) Race 1 Falken Motorsports clutches the overall win Race 2 ABT Motorsports played themselves and fumbled the win in race 2 → Pepper was told to let the clock run out because they were not going to make it on fuel, however he ended up slowing down too much and which resulted in Vanthoor from Manthey snatching the win Other Sports Car News Drama at the Nurburgring Explanation of the drama → Owners of the Nurburgring wanted to run their own series as opposed to NLS running it (caused a split between the two, similar to the CART IRL split) NES (Nurburgring Endurance series) vs NLS NES double header season opener races canceled (week of 3/19) Drama in GTD IMSA (3/25/24) AWA withdraws the #17 Corvette (in a rage quit kind of fashion) Initially started as an IG post (with a lot of attitude) then later announced on Twitter that they were withdrawing the car Continuing the season with one car Statement from AWA on Twitter → “Anthony Mantella has elected to step away from the GTD program at this moment in time. The #13 car will continue to proceed as planned and will be present at the upcoming round in Long Beach.” The Dacia Logan returns to the Nurburgring 24H this year Sebastian Vettel Tests Porsche Penske 963 Will we see him in the 963 at a race soon? → No plans from Porsche to draft him for the 2024 LeMans entry list Qatar 1812 km Post Hoc penalties 02 Cadillac gets DQ’d due to modification of a homologated part (the rough year for GM continues) Vista AF Corse Ferrari (54 Ferrari LMGT3) fined €60,000 ($64,800 USD) for sneaking extra engineers on the grid (team tried to disguise them as sales/marketing staff and claimed they didn’t touch the car) As a result Toyota and BMWgot points (BMW are DQ/Penalty merchants) WEC requiring a minimum of 2 entries for the Hypercar class starting next season Good decision or not? (FIA/ACO shooting themselves in the foot imo and creating a solution to a problem that does not exist) Rule that forbids Hypercar manufacturers from running more than two factory cars is still in place (LeMans is the only race exempt from that rule) Would spell trouble for customer and privateer teams like Isotta Fraschini
