A 60-car field has been assembled for the final round of the 2025 GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup, the 10th Festival de la Velocidad, at Circuit de Barcelona Catalunya, Spain this weekend.
The focus heading to Spain is on the battle for the overall championship, with three crews set to duel it out during Sunday’s three-hour race on the 14-turn circuit.
Mercedes-AMG Team MANN-FILTER’s #48 AMG GT3 Evo line-up of Matteo Cairoli, Maro Engel and Lucas Auer leads the drivers’ championship on 72 points. The German outfit will be hoping to repeat its performance from last season, when it secured the Sprint Cup drivers’ title at the Spanish venue.
In second place, five points behind, is the #96 Rutronik Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R (992) of Sven Müller, Alessio Picariello and Patric Niederhauser. Rutronik has a strong history at Barcelona, having captured Porsche’s maiden Sprint Cup victory here last year, and another win this weekend would give them the title.
Following a disappointing outing at the previous round at the Nürburgring, the #32 Team WRT BMW M4 GT3 Evo of Kelvin van der Linde, Charles Weerts and Ugo De Wilde is very much the outsider to add the Endurance Cup crown to van der Linde and Weerts’ Sprint Cup success
The trio sit 17 points behind the #48 Mercedes-AMG crew, meaning scoring BMW’s maiden GT World Challenge victory at Barcelona will almost certainly be necessary if they are to mount a title tilt.
The same three outfits will simultaneously battle for the teams’ title. Here, Mercedes-AMG Team MANN-FILTER-operator Winward Racing holds a four-point advantage over Rutronik Racing, with Team WRT 16 points behind.
The season-long GT World Challenge Europe titles will also be settled this weekend. Defending drivers’ champions Auer/Engel lead the way, with Müller/Niederhauser and Weerts/van der Linde five and 12 points behind respectively.
Luca Engstler and Jordan Pepper, who will share the 24 Hours of Spa-winning #63 GRT – Grasser Racing Team Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo2 with Mirko Bortolotti this weekend, are also in contention for this title at 23 points back.
The season-long teams’ championship is headed by Team WRT, with the Belgian squad seven points ahead of Winward Racing and 18 clear of Rutronik as it guns for a record-extending sixth title.
Outside of the spotlight of the championship battles, there is plenty for the rest of the 17-car Pro class to fight for this weekend.
Outgoing champion AF Corse – Francorchamps Motors will be hoping to snap a two-year winless streak in the Endurance Cup, which dates back to its one-two triumph at Barcelona in 2023. The Italian team has made a change to its driver line-up for this weekend, due to Alessandro Pier Guidi racing at Petit Le Mans.
The three-time Endurance Cup champion has been replaced by 24 Hours of Le Mans winner Ye Yifei in the #51 Ferrari 296 GT3. Ye is making his first Endurance Cup start since Monza 2024, another occasion he stepped in due to a clash with the IMSA Sportscar Championship.
Another team forced to make a change due to Petit Le Mans is Schumacher CLRT. With Laurin Heinrich and Klaus Bachler piloting AO Racing’s ‘Rexy’ Porsche stateside, newly crowned DTM champion Ayhancan Güven is joined by Larry Ten Voorde and series debutant Alessandro Ghiretti in the #22 Porsche.
Elsewhere, HRT Ford Performance will be hoping to build off of its strongest GT World Challenge appearance to date last time out at the Nürburgring, whilst Rowe Racing will be looking to build on its first win of the season.
The Gold Cup field has dropped from 10 to eight cars for this weekend, with a pair of Porsches absent. Wright Motorsports is at Petit Le Mans, whilst Herberth Motorsport has moved its Gold Cup entry to the Bronze Cup class.
Three cars remain in contention for the Gold Cup titles, headed by the #33 Verstappen.Com Racing Aston Martin Vantage AMR GT3 Evo of Chris Lulham, Thierry Vermeulen and Harry King.
AlManar Racing by WRT’s Jens Klingmann, Al Faisal Al Zubair and Ben Tuck are 16 points behind in the #777 BMW, with Simon Gachet, Arthur Rougier and James Kell in a must-win scenario aboard the #111 CSA Racing McLaren GT3 Evo at 22 points back.
The Silver Cup is the largest class this weekend, with 19 cars representing all 10 manufacturers in the field.
Century Motorsport’s Jarrod Waberski, William Moore and Mex Jansen hold a comfortable 18-point lead in the championship after three consecutive podium finishes aboard the #42 BMW M4 GT3 Evo.
Loris Cabirou, Cesar Gazeau and Aurelien Panis sit second in the #10 Boutsen VDS Mercedes-AMG, with the #992 Paradine Competition BMW of James Kellett, Pedro Ebrahim and Charles Clark a further three points behind.
Gazeau and Panis, who won at Barcelona in 2024, lead Jansen by only two points in the season-long competition as they aim to defend their crown, whilst Boutsen VDS has a 23-point gap over Paradine Competition for the season-long teams’ title.
The additional entry compared to the Nürburgring comes courtesy of Greystone GT, which is making its championship debut with the #77 McLaren for Jayden Kelly, Zac Meakin and Michael O’Brien.
In the #6 GetSpeed Mercedes-AMG, Tom Kalender has replaced Lin Hodenius, whilst Austrian Gerhard Tweraser is making his first GT World Challenge Europe appearance since Barcelona 2023 in the #19 GRT – Grasser Racing Team Lamborghini. Tweraser, notably, won on that occasion as part of a Grasser one-two.
Adam Ali has joined Steller Motorsport and the #24 Corvette Z06 GT3.R, with Mattia Michelotto returning to the #60 VSR Lamborghini after missing the Nürburgring.
And the field is completed by the 16-car Bronze Cup entry.
Kessel Racing look poised to complete a clean sweep of the Bronze Cup titles in 2025, with only the Endurance Cup drivers’ crown yet to go to the Swiss squad.
Here, its #74 Ferrari crew of Conrad Laursen, Dennis Marschall and Dustin Blattner is 21 points ahead of Winward Racing’s Rinat Salikhov, Marvin Dienst and Gabriele Piana with 26 points still available.
The #91 Herberth Motorsport Porsche is absent this weekend, but as mentioned above, the German outfit’s #92 entry has transferred to the Bronze Cup. This car features a merger of Herberth’s former driver line-ups, with Alfred Renauer and Ralf Bohn moving over from the #91 to join Tim Heinemann.
Elsewhere, Bastian Buus has joined UNX Racing’s #888 Porsche. Mathieu Detry and Fabian Duffiuex raced the Dinamic GT-supported entry as a duo at the Nürburgring.
Nürburgring winner 2 Seas Motorsport, who won the British GT teams’ championship last weekend, is returning for its third start of the season. British GT GT3 drivers’ champions Charles Dawson and Kiern Jewiss will be joined in the #222 Mercedes-AMG by Thomas Lebbon.
The final round of the 2025 GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup takes place at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, Spain, from 10th to 12th October.
Following the Bronze Test on Friday, Free Practice and Pre-Qualifying will be held on Saturday ahead of Qualifying on Sunday morning. The three-hour season finale begins at 15:00 CEST on Sunday.
Images courtesy of SRO/JEP
