Ford Performance has announced the signing of five more works drivers for the new Ford Mustang GT3’s debut season in 2024.
Ben Barker, Chris Mies, Dennis Olsen, Andy Priaulx, and Frédéric Vervisch will join the previously announced quartet of Joey Hand, Dirk Müller, Harry Tincknell, and Mike Rockenfeller. Combined, they will support the Ford Multimatic Motorsports factory effort in GTD Pro and Mustang GT3 customer efforts in IMSA GTD, GT World Challenge Europe, and the FIA World Endurance Championship.
“This is such an important and special year for Mustang – it will celebrate its 60th anniversary and we take Mustang racing globally,” said Mark Rushbrook, Global Director of Ford Performance Motorsports. “To take an icon like Mustang racing, we need a line-up of the best and most experienced GT racers, and our nine sports car factory drivers represent just that.”
“Together with our partners at Multimatic Motorsports and our first customer teams Proton Competition and Dinamic GT, we are ready to take on the best in the world at the most iconic race circuits. I can’t wait to get started at Daytona in January.”
With this announcement, Mies and Vervisch are also confirmed to run in the Rolex 24 Hours at Daytona in January, completing the lineup for the Ford Multimatic Motorsports GTD Pro team in the Mustang GT3’s debut race.
Mies, a two-time champion of the Nürburgring 24 Hour and Bathurst 12 Hour races and two-time ADAC GT Masters champion, will race alongside Tincknell and Rockenfeller in the #64 car; Vervisch, another two-time Nürburgring 24 Hour champion, will share the #65 with Hand and Müller.
Barker, who has already been confirmed in one of Proton Competition’s entries in the WEC, is a stalwart of the championship and also boasts an overall win in the Dubai 24 Hours.
Norwegian driver Olsen’s CV includes the 2019 Intercontinental GT Challenge Drivers’ Championship. He’s spent the last two seasons in the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters (DTM) series.
Finally, Ford welcomes back three-time World Touring Car Champion Priaulx to the family. He was a stalwart of the Ford GTE programme from its inception in 2016 to its conclusion in 2019. Since then, he has been working on several special projects with Multimatic and has seen his son, Sebastian, begin his own sports car racing career at the highest levels. Ford states that Priaulx will act as a “super sub” in his second go-round with the manufacturer.
All nine drivers will be available to Ford’s customer teams in 2024, which so far includes Proton Competition in WEC plus IMSA GTD and Dinamic GT in GT World Challenge Europe. The full driver lineups for these teams will be announced at a later date, with only Barker and gentleman driver Ryan Hardwick confirmed in Proton’s WEC efforts so far.
