Blancpain endurance series 2012

[AndrewF31]

Time for another Update!

BMW Z4:
- 2 x Marc VDS
- 2 x db Motorsport - confirmed (1 with Simon Knap & Jeroen de Boer)
- 1 x Barwell Motorsport - confirmed
- 1 x ROAL Motorsport - confirmed at least Spa - with Thomas Biagi at least?

Audi R8 LMS:
- 2 x Belgian Audi Club WRT - confirmed based on Laurens Vanthoor news
- 1 x Sainteloc
- 1 x Novadriver (Portuguese team showed interest but I think they haven't got enough funding for this year)

News bit on Facebook page of Blancpain said 5 Audis were guaranteed at least.

McLaren MP4-12C:
- 2 x United Autsports - confirmed (1 PRO - Matt Bell/David Brabham/Álvaro Parente + 1 PRO-AM with Mark Blundell, Mark Patterson and Zak Brown)
- 2 x Gulf Racing - confirmed (Rob Bell, Mike Wainwright + Stuart Hall, Roald Goethe)
- 2 x Von Ryan Racing - confirmed (1 with Rob Barff/Leon Price)
- 1 x ASM Team
- 2 x Boutsen Ginion - confirmed

Nissan GT-R GT3:
- 1 x RJN Motorsport - confirmed - 1 of the GT Academy graduates, Jann Mardebrough, in the car

Ferrari 458 GT3:
- 2 x ASP SOFREV
- 2 x AF Corse - confirmed 2 PRO-AM (Matt Griffin & Jack Gerber + Yannick Mallegol, Jean-Marc Bachelier & Howard Blanc)
- 2 x Vita4One Team Italy (Matteo Bobbi's new team) - confirmed
- 1 x Sport Garage
- 1 x Insight Racing - confirmed (http://on.fb.me/xVR6Yd)

Porsche 997 GT3-R:
- 1 x Autorlando
- 1 x Larbre Competition
- 1 x Mühlner Motorsport
- 1 x SMG (Philippe Gache's team)
- 2 x Trackspeed (3 British GT squads recently announced)
- 2 x Ruffier Racing - confirmed
- 2 x Pro Gt by Almeras
- 2 x Exagon Engineering - confirmed 1 at least (with Christian Kelders & Daniel Desbruères)

Lamborghini Gallardo LP-600:
- 2 x Reiter Engineering - 1 confirmed (news on Endurance Info that apparently only 1 here with Peter Kox and Marc Hayek)
- 1 x Ruffier Racing - confirmed in Gentleman Trophy
- 1 x DVB Racing - if there are drivers
- 1 x Rhinos Leipert
- 1 x Rhinos Leipert Portugal Team (rumors in Portugal that this may become a team with BMW Z4, but very far-fetched rumors)

Mercedes SLS AMG:
- 1 x Preci-Spark (Jones brothers)
- 1 x Black Falcon
- 1 x Heico Motorsport
- 1 x Graff Racing
- 1 x KRK Racing (with Jeffrey Van Hooydonk, Koen Wouters & Anthony Kumpen?)

Aston Martin Vantage:
- 1 x Barwell Motorsport - abandoned for the BMW Z4 program?
- 1 x Beachdean - select rounds

Dodge Viper GT3:
- GT3 Racing - confirmed PRO-AM (Aaron Scott, Craig Wilkins, Andy Ruhan)

BMW M3 GT4:
- 1 x DVB Racing - if there are drivers

[Nic_O]

ROAL confirmed 2 cars and Thomas Biagi, Stefano Colombo and Michela Cerruti as drivers. Don't know if they will share the same car though.

[alexkiller8]

no please... not even here michela cerruti... she's spending all his father's money to make epic fails in all champs she (pay to) run.

[rich07]

Great to see Thomas Biagi in there though.

[AndrewF31]

Originally Posted by Nic_O

ROAL confirmed 2 cars and Thomas Biagi, Stefano Colombo and Michela Cerruti as drivers. Don't know if they will share the same car though.

Are you basing that on the Endurance Info article?
To me it seems to only confirm:
- 2 BMWs in Italian GT
- Outings in Blancpain, without specifying if it's with both cars and in which races besides Spa

[GregoryDG]

Originally Posted by AndrewF31

Are you basing that on the Endurance Info article?
To me it seems to only confirm:
- 2 BMWs in Italian GT
- Outings in Blancpain, without specifying if it's with both cars and in which races besides Spa

I think you're exactly right about that. They're racing Biagi-Colombo and Cerruti-TBA in Italian GT and want to do the Spa 24h with other outings in Blancpain if there isn't a clash with Italian GT or Intl. Superstars I think.

The official BES Facebook page is talking about 5 Audi LMS cars at least. They will be entered by a Belgian team (WRT), a German team (Phoenix?) and a Swedish team (Brunstedt?).

A Belgian magazine also wrote about JRM going to Blancpain next to their WEC entry. GT World is only an option if fundings can be found...

[Nic_O]

Originally Posted by AndrewF31

Are you basing that on the Endurance Info article?
To me it seems to only confirm:
- 2 BMWs in Italian GT
- Outings in Blancpain, without specifying if it's with both cars and in which races besides Spa

Yes, it was only based on this article. Sorry, I misunderstood, the French version of the article doesn't specify that they will only be doing outings.

[AndrewF31]

Originally Posted by GregoryDG

The official BES Facebook page is talking about 5 Audi LMS cars at least. They will be entered by a Belgian team (WRT), a German team (Phoenix?) and a Swedish team (Brunstedt?).

A Belgian magazine also wrote about JRM going to Blancpain next to their WEC entry. GT World is only an option if fundings can be found...

Missed that comment on Facebook Gregory! Thanks.

- WRT for sure

- For Germany, Phoenix makes sense, but it could also be Abt Sportsline expanding their projects. There were some rumors they were possibly going to LM. Either that was a rumor or they have more money to work with.
In fact, when you look at GT Masters, neither Phoenix nor Abt have committed so far.

- For Sweden, no idea. Brunstedt


About JRM, another Nissan GT-R is always nice.

[urdragon]

Few Nissan's, few Aston's, and cool the Viper, what about the camaro which reiter was working at? The other cars have enough entries with 7 cars with at least 5 entries per car, great variety.

[AndrewF31]

Time for another Update!

BMW Z4:
- 2 x Marc VDS
- 2 x db Motorsport - confirmed (1 with Simon Knap & Jeroen de Boer)
- 1 x Barwell Motorsport - confirmed
- 1 x ROAL Motorsport - confirmed at least Spa - with Thomas Biagi at least?

Audi R8 LMS:
Blancpain Facebook page says 5 cars at least from Belgium, German and Swedish teams
- 2 x Belgian Audi Club WRT - confirmed based on Laurens Vanthoor news (probably the Belgium team)
- 1/2 x Phoenix or Abt - speculation about German team
- 1/2 x Swedish team - Brundstedt?
- 1 x Sainteloc
- 1 x Novadriver (Portuguese team showed interest but I think they haven't got enough funding for this year)

McLaren MP4-12C:
- 2 x United Autsports - confirmed (1 PRO - Matt Bell/David Brabham/Álvaro Parente + 1 PRO-AM with Mark Blundell, Mark Patterson and Zak Brown)
- 2 x Gulf Racing - confirmed (Rob Bell, Mike Wainwright + Stuart Hall, Roald Goethe)
- 2 x Von Ryan Racing - confirmed (1 with Rob Barff/Leon Price)
- 1 x ASM Team
- 2 x Boutsen Ginion - confirmed

Nissan GT-R GT3:
- 1 x RJN Motorsport - confirmed - 1 of the GT Academy graduates, Jann Mardebrough, in the car
- Parallel program from JRM Racing?

Ferrari 458 GT3:
- 2 x ASP SOFREV
- 2 x AF Corse - confirmed 2 PRO-AM (Matt Griffin & Jack Gerber + Yannick Mallegol, Jean-Marc Bachelier & Howard Blanc)
- 2 x Vita4One Team Italy (Matteo Bobbi's new team) - confirmed
- 1 x Sport Garage
- 1 x Insight Racing - confirmed (http://on.fb.me/xVR6Yd)

Porsche 997 GT3-R:
- 1 x Autorlando
- 1 x Larbre Competition
- 1 x Mühlner Motorsport
- 1 x SMG (Philippe Gache's team)
- 2 x Trackspeed (3 British GT squads recently announced)
- 2 x Ruffier Racing - confirmed
- 2 x Pro Gt by Almeras
- 2 x Exagon Engineering - confirmed 1 at least (with Christian Kelders & Daniel Desbruères)

Lamborghini Gallardo LP-600:
- 2 x Reiter Engineering - 1 confirmed (news on Endurance Info that apparently only 1 here with Peter Kox and Marc Hayek)
- 1 x Ruffier Racing - confirmed in Gentleman Trophy
- 1 x DVB Racing - if there are drivers
- 1 x Rhinos Leipert
- 1 x Rhinos Leipert Portugal Team (rumors in Portugal that this may become a team with BMW Z4, but very far-fetched rumors)

Mercedes SLS AMG:
- 1 x Preci-Spark (Jones brothers)
- 1 x Black Falcon
- 1 x Heico Motorsport
- 1 x Graff Racing
- 1 x KRK Racing (with Jeffrey Van Hooydonk, Koen Wouters & Anthony Kumpen?)

Aston Martin Vantage:
- 1 x Barwell Motorsport - abandoned for the BMW Z4 program?
- 1 x Beachdean - select rounds

Dodge Viper GT3:
- GT3 Racing - confirmed PRO-AM (Aaron Scott, Craig Wilkins, Andy Ruhan)

BMW M3 GT4:
- 1 x DVB Racing - if there are drivers

[GT3 RSR]

Are there really no entries in the cup class this year?

[AndrewF31]

Originally Posted by GT3 RSR

Are there really no entries in the cup class this year?

Not sure. The only news I have found so far is mainly GT3. Even GT4 seems weak.

I'm sure the GT4 and Cup teams, being more low profile, they are harder to find out about until the Organization publishes an entry list.

Basically, apart from the large list above, we could still have some more entries (10 or more, guess work) in those 2 categories.

[lms]

what happened to that gemballa project? (-> to ADAC gt masters. damn )

[cmk]

Originally Posted by urdragon

Few Nissan's, few Aston's, and cool the Viper, what about the camaro which reiter was working at? The other cars have enough entries with 7 cars with at least 5 entries per car, great variety.

Last I heard they were focusing on making it a sprint car first, and then considering developing it for enduros after.

[GregoryDG]

Originally Posted by lms

what happened to that gemballa project? (-> to ADAC gt masters. damn )

Gemballa told me they were planning to do Spa 24h with both cars .

[GT3 RSR]

Originally Posted by AndrewF31

Not sure. The only news I have found so far is mainly GT3. Even GT4 seems weak.

I'm sure the GT4 and Cup teams, being more low profile, they are harder to find out about until the Organization publishes an entry list.

Basically, apart from the large list above, we could still have some more entries (10 or more, guess work) in those 2 categories.

That makes sense.

We are considering doing silverstone but don't want to be the only car in the class considering the cost to mod the car with bag tank ect

[lms]

thats good news

[AndrewF31]

Gemballa is in ADAC Masters as mentioned, as are the Reiter Camaros. YACO Racing is entering 2 in that championship.

The Camaro was also seen snowplowing on some circuit a week or so ago trying to do some tests with Peter Kox on board. They should have invited one of the new F1s with the shovels they have on the front wings now.

From what I understood Gemballa was entering 4 cars, 2 together with Zakspeed and another 2 with Molitor-Racing. Am I right? All McLarens.

[rich07]

4 McLarens? With only twenty or so cars released this year, how would one team besides CRS possibly get four cars? I cant see it happening.

[jo1998sh]

JB motorsport with and Audi r8

http://translate.google.com/translat...5.html&act=url

[Jameson]

Originally Posted by GT3 RSR

Are there really no entries in the cup class this year?

Now that the series is taking off and there'll be a lot of GT3 cars, I think they should simply drop the Cup class and maybe also GT4 and make it a high profile international endurance series with Pro / Pro-Am / Gentleman classes, all GT3. It would make it more simple for the fans, the racing better and create a quality grid from 1st to last row.

[GregoryDG]

Black Falcon will enter two Mercedes in BES. Nothing known about driver line-ups yet. (http://blancpain-endurance-series.co...em.php?key=226)

Kenneth Heyer will be driving for Heico Motorsport this year, this possible means that Heico will enter its Mercedes at Spa (as Heyer said he will do Spa 24).

[FordCosworthPanoz]

Originally Posted by GregoryDG

Black Falcon will enter two Mercedes in BES. Nothing known about driver line-ups yet. (http://blancpain-endurance-series.co...em.php?key=226)

Kenneth Heyer will be driving for Heico Motorsport this year, this possible means that Heico will enter its Mercedes at Spa (as Heyer said he will do Spa 24).

This is going to be a great season, hopefully one of those Black Falcon SLSs will be entered into the Pro class. Love the variety, format, and teams/drivers in this series.

[FstrthnU]

http://www.planetlemans.com/2012/02/...ns+Newsfeed%29

Planet Le Mans has amassed a collection of the full-season entries

[911targa]

Cool summary, going to have a great grid this year.