A total of 27 cars will kick off the Sprint Series of the Italian GT 2020 Championship with the first two races to be held this coming weekend at the Misano World Circuit. After the opening meeting of the Endurance series in Mugello, the Sprint series will be quite packed at Misano with a season record of participation that includes GT Cup that was not present in Mugello and that will join GT3 and GT4 for this round.

GT3: A total of 14 GT3 cars will get on track in Misano. Among these, the Audi R8 LMS of Agostini-Mancinelli comes from the good win in Mugello. Considering the great result in Tuscany, the Audi Sport Italia pairing will be the one to beat, despite the absence of the great protagonist of the Endurance series Mattia Drudi. Riccardo Agostini is the reigning champion of the Sprint series and Daniel Mancinelli is one of the strongest GT drivers on the international scene, these ingredients make this pairing one of the favourites to the final win.

Alessio Rovera will kick off his season in Misano aiming at the title. He is also a reigning champion and will share the wheel of the AF Corse Ferrari 488 with Giorgio Roda after the good fourth place scored with Antonio Fuoco in Mugello. AF Corse will also field a second car for Cressoni-Mann, while the other 488 will be run by Easy Race for Michelotto-Hudspeth, that were also present in Mugello, and by RS Racing that is back to the Italian championship with the PRO-AM 2019 vice-champions Di Amato-Vezzoni.

Four Lamborghini Huracan entered the series. Two of which are run by VSR for Nemoto-Tujula and Kroes-Pulcini, while Imperiale Racing will give its own to Venturini-Galbiati, that came third in Mugello with Postiglione, and LP Racing to Cazzaniga-Marcucci, that confirmed their presence in the Sprint series after the AM win in 2019. Two Porsche GT3 R will join the challenge: one driven by Venerosi-Baccani (Ebimotors) and one by Cassarà-De Giacomi for Dinamic Motorsport, the team that is at its debut in the Italian series. The two Mercedes AMG GT3 of AKM Motorsport will be driven by the 2018 Daniel Zampieri with the 17 years old co-equiper Lorenzo Ferrari and by Davide Roda and Loris Spinelli.

Stefano Comandini and the 17 years old German Marius Zug will be present also in the Sprint series in the BMW M6 GT3. They come from the second place in Mugello with co-equiper Alexander Sims. The drivers of BMW Team Italia-Ceccato Motors Racing Team definitely have what it takes to fight for the title.

GT4: GT4 set a new participation record: 10 cars will get on track, compared to the 4 that contested the round in Mugello. The protagonists of the first Endurance race will be the men to beat in the opener of the Sprint series that will most probably live on the Porsche-BMW-Mercedes fight. Porsche will field the winners in Mugello Gnemmi-Pera, that were joined by De Castro in the occasion, but the driver from Rho will share the wheel with Gianluigi Piccioli on the second car ran by Ebimotors in Misano. Four Caymans will be present in this occasion. The Porsche Ticino Center will field two 718 in Misano for Matteo Arrigosi-Adriano Pan and Daniel Webster-Giacomo Riva.

The BMW M4 GT4 will be driven by Paolo Meloni of W&D Racing Team, that is at the debut in the Italian championship, and will side BMW Team Italia-Ceccato Motors Racing Team’s cars driven by Guerra-Riccitelli, that were second in Mugello with co-equiper Nicola Neri.

Four Mercedes AMG GT4 will challenge the rivals on the 4.226 meters of the Italian circuit. Three of these will be run by Nova Race: alongside team owner Luca Magnoni, who was present in Mugello with the Norwegian Schjerpen, the other cars will be driven by Marchetti-Mantori, who already took part in last year’s campaign, and the new entries Luca Segù and Francesco De Luca. The fourth car of the Affalterbach brand will be run by SVC SM for the rookie Jodi Vullo and a very experienced driver like Andrea Belicchi in the partnership involving Scuderia Villorba Corse and Trivellato Racing.

GT CUP: At opener of the Endurance series no GT Cup cars were present, but three cars will contest the race in Misano instead: two Ferrari 488 Challenge and one Porsche 991 4.0. The Maranello cars will see the debut in the Italian Championship of SR&R team with Luca Demarchi and the GT3 Light reigning champion Gian Piero Cristoni, while the second Challenge will feature the Easy Race livery and will be driven by Matteo Greco and GT4 Endurance reigning champion Riccardo Chiesa. Porsche colors will be represented by Duell Motorsport’s Carrera Cup Italia car driven by two known names: Vincenzo Sauto and Gianluca Carboni.

 

THE PROGRAM: The first of four weekends of the Sprint series will get underway on Friday, July 31st at local 10:50 with the first free practice session that will be followed by the second at 16,25. The two qualifying sessions will go live on TV on MS Motor TV (Sky 228) on Saturday at 10.40. Race-1 will follow in the afternoon at 18.40, while race-2 will take place on Sunday from 14.30. Both races will be run on the length of 50 minutes + 1 lap and will go live on Raisport, web streaming from www.acisportspa.it/CIGT and from the Facebook page of the championship www.facebook.com/CIGranTurismo.

On Twitter

@CIGranTurismo

@GTavoni

www.acisport.it/CIGT

www.facebook.com/CIGranTurismo