Sports Cars GT Racing - GT1, GT3, Blancpain Endurance Series & National GT Series

Not too much doubt now.

 

1-3, 1-3! Great race, damn, the best this year so far.

 

That's why this endurance racing, when gearbox falling last lap.

 

Not heard a Porsche make a sound like that AND keep going before.

 

Yeah, I meant to say I saw the end of the 2020 24 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps about a half-hour ago. Just to be able to survive the way the outright winner did is just amazing. Doing so on a legendary and challenging Formula 1 course is even more worthy of love and respect. This was a great race, and I'm glad to be able to see this event streamed.

My congratulations go out to the outright winner and the class winners of this year's race. Oh- and Porsche power. Got to love it.

 

http://gt-place.com/2020/10/30/zakspeed-plant-viper-einsatz-bei-24h-dubai-2021/

Good news for any Viper fans out there.

The page is in German but the general message is that Zakspeed is heading to the next Dubai 24 Hours with their SRT Viper GT3-R.

That’s good to hear. The Viper will indeed race again even if just once.

 

I remember visiting the FIA GT Championship round 1999 on the Hungaroring. The first thing I heard still far away from the track was a low and very loud growl. As it turned out, those sounds came from the ORECA Viper GT2 cars. It was great to see those V10s thundering around the track. Although, nothing was even close to the Panoz, you couldn’t hear a damn thing when it was close, no matter how many cars were around it, including the 2 Vipers

 

I'm looking forward to seeing the Brabham BT62 more in GT racing, especially the top tier categories. It had its debut in Britcar last year where it was limited to 60% throttle apparently, but I am apparently waiting until 2022 before they hope to be at Le Mans according to their website.

 

SRO could take over Australian GT: https://sportscar365.com/other-series/australian-gt/report-sro-poised-for-australian-gt-takeover/

Thoughts from down under?

 

I can only see that as a step in the right direction.

As the report says, Australian GT has been on life support in recent times.

 

Yes please.

 

If it means a healthier GT series I'm down.

 

But, GTWC America is all but dead. The Touring Car and GT4 series' are still pretty healthy, but COVID really was a kick in the teeth for the series. I don't think any race ran with more than 10 GT3 cars.

 

It's just not promoted well here, since ownership switched. There were about 11 cars last year. The Quinns ran a tight ship and it was good for the series. It didn't help that V8/VASC did try to sabotage the series with race dates and banning Supercars drivers in the B12H.

There are, supposedly, plenty GT4 owners here. It's been said those gentlemen drivers want to run on their own, so as not to be caught up in GT3 drama. Getting the series on track, for something like the European GT4 Series would be fantatstic. I like the PWC GT4 races with TCR America as well. I doubt we'll see GT4 and TCR Australia run together, but that'd draw crowds at the right venue.

 

Let’s be honest. The Pirelli World Challenge was just better than the American Blancpain series. It’s probably the one racing series I miss the most that’s now (sort of) defunct.

 

I watched World Challenge since the Speedvision days, up until the time I left the states(2008). It was always great racing.

 

I understood why they made the switch to GT3 (starting even before the SRO takeover), but they failed to realize that GT3 cars were too expensive for many of their competitors. Was a time when you could buy the Viper Competition Coupe and immediately be competitive. Oh, how I miss that car.

World Challenge was great when it was a much production class. When it followed the rules in many of the SCCA club classes. Kept costs low and participation very high. Why the Touring Car classes in GT4 America are huge.

 

Yeah the even more older stuff was pretty great, but even during the GT3-era you got some really interesting cars showing up like the Volvo S60s, the Cadillac ATS-V that were made specifically for the series were some of the coolest GT cars ever made in my opinion. Not to mention you'd get decently sized grids most years.

But yeah, imagine if the sort of cost-effective formula was continued today. I wonder what kind of cars we would have seen being made out of stock vehicles from the 2010s.

 

The CTS-V was a better example as the ATS-V was an actual GT3 car. I believe it did get run in Europe at one point.

RealTime Racing coming up with the rear wheel drive (might've even been AWD) TLX-GT.



The series did have a Mustang win the title in '09 as well.

The series had become a bit like the GT300 class in Japan. Rules where fairly open to seem to cater to a less-tradition sportscar, unlike the European GT series at the time. You had the Porsche's (what GT class doesn't?), but you didn't see many Ferrari's, Aston's, Lambo's, or the array of small builders we saw in British GT.

With the GT300 Mother Chassis, maybe we will see more of these odd, but spectacular cars back. Like the Crown in @05XR8's avatar pic.

 

The car in my pic is totally production based. Between old school WC Audi RS6 and WC TC. More like GT4 spec.

The RTR NSX punched above its weight. My memory is fading a bit, but I think it was the Whelen(Wheelen?) Vette that was hard to beat. Also, the Vipers seemed to make it unfair back then.

I also liked the IMSA era, when the M5 used to run. Closer to production based the better. It's one of the many reasons why I dig the car in my avatar.

Anyway, we'll see what comes of the situation here.

 

Wow, that M5 looked great, the E34 is my favorite 5er generation. I didn't know about the M5 being in IMSA competition, Hungarian car magazines in the '90s didn't talk about the US scene too much. Nevertheless, your thread is within the top 10 for an "imsa bmw m5" search

I'm a big touring car fan - although not a particular fan of TCR - and the '90s touring cars are for me the golden era (DTM, Gr. A, Supertouring), this fits right in.

 

I couldn't watch most of the racing during the weekend but was a bit feeling blue when I read that the GTWC Endurance race at Paul Ricard was won by a Ferrari. As a Porsche fan I was overjoyed to see what the various Porsche outfits achieved over the weekend.

IMSA GTLM: 1-2
IMSA GTD: 1
WEC GTE-Pro: 1-2
WEC GTE-Am: 1
GTWC Europe: 2
24H Mugello: 1

I guess one could say that this was Porsche's weekend despite the Paul Ricard loss by 1.69 seconds.

 

Yeah, many real gems back in the day.

 

Or the short lived CART sanctioned North American Touring Car Championship and the PacWest Racing Dodge Stratus. Honestly with as many SuperTouring cars to pick from, it might be one of the best looking.

Probably meant for the SuperGT thread, but with the switch to GT3 in DTM, will we see Honda switch back to a mid engine car? Though, with the other manufacturers having to invest so much in the turbo I-4’s, will the series just make them wait until the next rules adjustment?

 

The front-engined NSX is for GT500 only which is Class One and DTM abandones it for next year. Honda already has a working GT3 car that just won the championship in IMSA GTD. Why would they need to change anything? In fact, there are mid-engined NSX GT3s in Super GT’s GT300 field already.

EDIT: some wording and extra info

 

I think you misunderstood. @HaydenFan69 was wondering, now that DTM has dropped Class One regulations, if Honda will revert back to a mid-engine layout for their GT500 NSX.

It’s an interesting point to make. While reverting back to mid-engine would regain a semblance of road relevance, it would be a very resourceful job especially while trying to remain on a level playing field with Nissan and Toyota.

 

Super GT continues to use Class One and they mandated Honda to switch their engine placement. I don’t see where would Honda have an opening here to switch back to mid-engined in GT500 as long as they wanna stay there with the current regs.

EDIT:
http://www.dailysportscar.com/2019/...witch-to-front-engined-gt500-car-in-2020.html

https://www.motorsport.com/supergt/news/honda-front-engined-nsx-class-one/4538715/

 

Honda doesn't sell an FR NSX. Even though Honda did run an FR(HSV) they never sold. The point is, Being DTM are no longer running parallel with Super GT, there's no reason to use Class One regulations. Super GT500 and GT300(DTM) won't be competing on the same level. No other counry run Class oNe regulations. Therefore, Honda can(if JAF allow) switch back to MR.

 

Sure. But a) JAF needs to decide so, b) more importantly, is that something Honda will want to pursue as they must have insisted a visible amount of money into the front-engined NSX-GT, especially given their successful run with it. I guess none of us here really knows it or can judge whether last year's mid-engined NSX-GT would be a competitive-enough basis for next year or would it make more sense financially and technically to continue with the 2020 model whether it matches the road-legal NSX or not.

From our fan perspective it may make sense but I don't believe it's that simple.