12-Hour regulars to get enduro miles in Texas

LIQUI-MOLY Bathurst 12 Hour teams and drivers will get some handy long-distance practice this weekend in Texas.

12-Hour staples MARC Cars Australia, Pro-Sport Performance and Brookspeed Racing will be amongst the 12-hour teams taking part in this weekend's Creventic 24-hour event at the Circuit of the Americas, while three Aussies have paired up in a locally-entered Porsche 911 GT3 Cup Car.

Stephen Grove, Sam Fillmore and Danny Stuttered will pair up in a Freem USA-entered current specification 991 GT3 Cup Car - a car that will make it's Aussie debut in Carrera Cup next year.

All three are Bathurst 12 Hour veterans, with Grove a two-time class winner and already confirmed to return next February.

MARC Cars Australia will run a pair of their V8-powered Mazda 3 entries.

Jake Camilleri, Keith Kassulke, Hadrian Morall and Morgan Haber will drive one car, while Malcolm Niall, Clint Harvey, Brett Niall and Robert Thompson the other. Belgian team VDS Racing Adventures will enter their customer MARC Ford Focus V8.

Open for GTs, touring cars and 24H Specials, the race at the Circuit Of The Americas in Austin, Texas, is the final round of Creventic's new-for-2017 ‘Championship of the Continents’.

It marks the first event for the Dutch agency to be held in the United States. A total of 25 different nationalities are expected on the grid for the 24-hour race, including seven US-based teams and one outfit from Mexico.

In total, 44 teams have registered to participate in the 24-hour race at the Circuit Of The Americas.

The A6 class, predominantly for GT3 cars, will account for a quarter of the grid, including 24H SERIES championship winners Hofor Racing. A6 class cars expected to race in Texas are the Mercedes-AMG GT3, Porsche 911 GT3 R, Chevrolet Corvette C6-ZR1, Lamborghini Huracán Super Trofeo, Aston Martin Vantage GT3 and the Audi R8 LMS.

Noteworthy drivers are regular IMSA class winners Jeroen Bleekemolen and Ben Keating in the #3 Black Falcon Mercedes-AMG GT3, the reigning German Porsche Carrera Cup champion Dennis Olsen in the #13 Manthey Racing Porsche 911 GT3 R, the Le Mans-experienced quartet of Roald Goethe, Stuart Hall, Jamie Campbell-Walker and Nicolas Minassian in the #31 ROFGO Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 and multiple 24H SERIES race winners Daniel Allemann, Ralf Bohn and Robert and Alfred Renauer in the #911 Herberth Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3 R.

Six Porsche 911 Cup cars have been entered in the 991 class, including 24H SERIES class champions PROsport Performance and its drivers Charles Putman, Charles Espenlaub and Joe Foster, plus Andy Pilgrim who is joining the team for the Texas round.

The SP2 class is the second-largest with eight entries, including a pair of the new Mercedes-AMG GT4, plus three MARC silhouette cars, two Porsche 991 Cup cars and a BMW M3 F80 Endurance. The SP3 class has two Porsche Cayman GT4 MRs, two BMWs and two Aston Martin Vantage GT4s.

Four TCR cars lead the touring car contingent, with two SEAT Leons facing competition from two Peugeot 308 Racing Cup cars, entered by reigning 24H SERIES touring car champions Team Altran Peugeot. Five BMW 235i Racing cars are competing in the CUP1 class, with multiple cycling champion Tom Boonen as one of the drivers for the Belgian QSR Racingschool team. Three Hondas and one Peugeot RCZ in the A2 class round out the field.

RadioLeMans.com will have live coverage of the event this weekend.

- With event media release.