There’s just over a month until the SRO Motorsports America series converge on Sonoma Raceway for their first full-scale meeting of 2023 – while GT America, the mixed class sprint series for amateur drivers, will support the IndyCar Grand Prix of St. Petersburg on the weekend of March 5.
Grids are starting to fill out in all three of SRO America’s sports car racing championships.
GT World Challenge America
This week it was announced that reigning GT World Challenge America Pro-Am champions, Racers Edge Motorsports, will retain the championship-winning pair of Ashton Harrison and Mario Farnbacher. For 2023, Harrison and Farnbacher will compete in the Pro class.
Harrison became the first woman to win a full-season championship in the near-40 year history of GT World Challenge America and its predecessor sports car racing series. After racing for 2022 as a derogated Bronze driver, she’ll now compete as a Silver-graded driver for her second season of GT racing.
The #93 Acura NSX GT3 Evo22 will supplement their latest SRO America campaign with a four-race slate in the IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup this year, the team already ran at Daytona – competing for a GTD podium until a power steering issue in the final hour – and will be at Sebring for the 12 Hours.
New team Esses Racing have announced that Adam Carroll will join the previously confirmed Will Hardeman in their Mercedes-AMG GT3, starting from the opening round at Sonoma.
The Irish racer is best known for his exploits in single-seaters: He was the final A1 Grand Prix series champion in 2008-09, spent time as a Formula One test driver for British American Racing, and most recently drove full-time for the Jaguar Formula E team in their maiden 2016-17 campaign.
Carroll has also had success in sports cars – a podium at Le Mans in GTE Am in 2016, and multiple wins in the British GT Championship including one in the opening round of the 2022 season at Oulton Park.
On 15 February, Wright Motorsports renewed the father and son-in-law partnership of Charlie Luck and Jan Heylen for another crack at the Pro-Am class championship.
2021 GT America GT3 champion Luck and 2021 World Challenge Pro-Am champion Heylen will drive the newest Porsche 911 GT3 R (992). The pair scored a sensational overall win in Race 1 at Watkins Glen, and four Pro-Am class wins including a sweep of the Sonoma round – but finished a close runner-up in the Pro-Am championships after misfortunes in the Indianapolis 8 Hour.
BMW factory racing driver John Edwards will join ST Racing and co-owner/driver Samantha Tan aboard the #38 BMW M4 GT3, in a planned full-season effort – and another new entry into the Pro category.
Edwards is beginning his tenth season as a BMW works driver. His last experience in this series or any of its forerunners, was a one-off at Laguna Seca in the 2016 SprintX GT Championship.
So far, that makes nine teams that have announced programmes in GTWCA with more still to come. Conquest Racing were the first to announce their 2023 plans last autumn – fielding a new Ferrari 296 GT3 for Manny Franco and Alessandro Balzan.
Reigning GT4 America Silver Cup champions Eric Filgueiras and Stevan McAleer in a new Porsche for Rennsport One (RS1), another new Porsche for newcomers MDK Motorsports, Trenton Estep, and Seth Lucas; and the return of The Racers Group (TRG) to GT3 action with an Aston Martin Vantage AMR GT3 driven by Ross Gunn and Derek DeBoer.
Turner Motorsport also plan to field at least one BMW M4 GT3 with sponsorship from McKenna Automotive, along with entries to be confirmed from more than a few series mainstays.
GT America
A big surprise, and a good one, arrived this past Thursday when Flying Lizard Motorsports confirmed that their classic silver and red colours would once again compete in American sports car racing.
Flying Lizard will enter the previous-generation Porsche 911 GT3 R (991.2), driven by team mainstay Andy Wilzoch, in the upper-tier SRO3 class.
Wilzoch took a sabbatical from racing last year, after a partial 2021 campaign in GT America headlined by an overall victory in Road America.
This means Flying Lizard will now have a presence in both GT America classes, supplementing the two-car Aston Martin Vantage AMR GT4 fleet for Elias Sabo and Jason Bell.
Another surprise is RealTime Racing – longtime stalwarts of SRO America and their predecessors with Acura/Honda – entering two Mercedes-AMG GT3s in a partnership with Bartone Bros Racing.
Bartone Bros ran a partial season in Porsche GT4s split between GT America and GT4 America, and will now run the full season in GT America’s top category. Anthony Bartone, driver of the black and red #427 car, begins his first full season in sports car racing. And Andy Pilgrim, 66 years young, will pilot the black and blue #43 Mercedes.
Pilgrim won last season at Road America driving for SKI Autosport, who now have Johnny O’Connell (no relation!) in their Ferrari 458 Italia GT3 this season.
Gray Newell has also been confirmed for a second GT America campaign with the Heart of Racing Team in a Vantage GT4, while Alex Vogel and P1 Groupe will enter the #943 Porsche 911 GT3 R (992) with sponsorship from adult content creator platform OnlyFans.
The good news is that we won’t have to wait long to see the entry list for the first round at St. Petersburg!
GT4 America
GT4 America’s lineup is also growing with every passing week – we’ve not yet had a chance to get to every announcement thus far, so here’s a quick catch-up:
Continuing programmes from last year will include Heart of Racing Team’s driver/principal Ian James – fresh off his Rolex 24 victory – and Gray Newell driving the #24 Aston Martin. Hannah Grisham and Rianna O’Meara-Hunt, the co-winners of Heart of Racing Team’s female driver search, will drive number 26.
Elias Sabo and Andy Lee will drive Flying Lizard’s #8 Aston Martin with its new black and orange paint scheme supplied by Sabo’s company 5.11 Tactical.
18-year-old Canadian Jesse Webb will succeed Gavin Sanders in the #34 Conquest Racing/JMF Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT4, Michai Stephens stays with the team as his co-driver. Webb is a graduate of Canada’s Nissan Sentra Cup series, taking a similar path to his predecessor Sanders.
Custodio Toledo and Paulo Carcasci are also expected to be confirmed for a second season in the #35 Conquest Racing Mercedes.
RENNtech Motorsports will enter a single Mercedes-AMG GT4, the #89 for Tommy Johnson and Michael Auriemma, in the Am class. RENNtech entered as many as two cars early in 2022 before multiple setbacks saw them drop off the grid.
TechSport Racing, pilot customers for the new Nissan Z GT4, have announced their driver line-ups for their inaugural season in GT4 America.
2011 GT Academy USA champion Bryan Heitkotter will partner rookie Grayson Farischon – who turns 17 next month – in the red and white #23. TC America veterans Eric Powell and Colin Harrison will drive the red and black #22.
The new BMW M4 GT4 is also represented through the two-car Random Vandals Racing team, featuring Paul Sparta and Al Carter in one Am class car, and Kenton Koch in a Pro-Am car with a co-driver to be announced.
A raft of Toyota GR Supra GT4 programmes are locked in for 2023.
And with them, another young woman will make her GT4 America debut this season: 18-year-old Isabella Robusto, a TRD Development Driver from the late-model stock car racing circuit, will race for Smooge Racing alongside Joey DaSilva – who himself is making his GT4 America debut after running in GT America last season.
Robusto, a native of Fort Mill, South Carolina, was the youngest woman ever selected to the NASCAR Drive for Diversity programme at age 12; last year, she ran 37 races and won twice across a schedule split between Hickory Motor Speedway and Tri-County Motor Speedway in North Carolina.
Smooge Racing driver/team principal Kevin Conway, himself a NASCAR alumnus of some notoriety, was also confirmed to drive alongside 19-year-old John Geesbreght – another TRD Development Driver – in the #68 Toyota, renewing the partnership that won the Am Cup title in 2021 and moved up to Silver Cup in 2022.
One announcement that snuck in at the end of 2022 was Copeland Motorsports joining the series with a GR Supra and reuniting 18-year-old drivers Tyler Maxson and Tyler Gonzalez.
“T-Max” and “T-Gun” recorded two podiums in a Copeland-run Hyundai Veloster N TCR in the 2021 Michelin Pilot Challenge. Maxson is a two-time TC America champion, and Gonzalez is a TRD Development Driver who will also drive for Dean Copeland’s squad in Toyota GR Cup.
Skip Barber Racing School will have their own team, appropriately named the Skip Barber Race Team, and a new Toyota GR Supra GT4.
Tech entrepeneur Matt Forbush, who introduced the GR Supra GT4 to GT4 America in 2021, will drive with 27-year-old Skip Barber driving instructor Carter Fartuch, who steps up from TC America after finishing runner-up in the TCA class this past season.
Mainstays of the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge, Van der Steur Racing, will enter GT4 America for the first time fielding an Aston Martin for Brady Behrman and Coby Shield. Another newcomer is Zotz Racing, entering a Porsche 718 Cayman GT4 RS Clubsport for Eric Zitza and Chris Ruppel.
