GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup

The Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup powered by AWS, formerly for sponsorship reasons the Blancpain Endurance Series from 2011 to 2015 and Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup from 2016 to 2019, is a sports car racing series developed by SRO Motorsports Group and the Royal Automobile Club of Belgium (RACB) with approval from the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). It features grand tourer racing cars modified from production road cars complying with the FIA's GT3 regulations. The series's goal is to be an endurance racing championship for GT3 cars, similar to the FIA World Endurance Championship which were using GTE cars and Le Mans Prototypes (now GT3 and Le Mans Hypercars). The series was primarily sponsored by Swiss watchmaker Blancpain, and the company's Lamborghini Super Trofeo series serve as support races. In 2019, SRO announced that their sponsorship deal with Blancpain had been discontinued and the series was renamed the GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup for the 2020 season.

GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup
CategoryGrand tourer
Endurance racing
CountryEurope
Inaugural season2011
Tyre suppliersMichelin (2011–2012)
Pirelli (2013–present)
Drivers' championAndorra Jules Gounon
Timur Boguslavskiy
Switzerland Raffaele Marciello
Teams' championFrance AKKodis ASP Team
Official websitewww.gt-world-challenge-europe.com
Current season
Presentation of the inaugural 2011 Blancpain Endurance Series season

Format

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Audi R8 LMS during Blancpain Endurance Series season
 
Audi R8 LMS Ultra from W Racing Team during the 2014 Blancpain Endurance Series round at the Nürburgring
 
Nissan GT-R GT3 driven by the 2015 Champions Alex Buncombe, Wolfgang Reip and Katsumasa Chiyo at the 2015 24 Hours of Spa
 
Mercedes AMG GT3 from Black Falcon at the 2018 24 Hours of Spa
 
The Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo driven by Jules Gounon, Daniel Juncadella and Raffaele Marciello that won the 2022 Overall Championship

The GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup reestablishes several elements of the former FIA GT Championship, with three hour endurance races held on European circuits such as Monza and Silverstone, as well as a continuation of the Spa 24 Hours. The races feature five classes derived from the FIA's GT3, GT4, and Supersport regulations, with the GT3 cars divided into a class for professional driver line-ups (GT3 Pro), a class for a mixed team of professional and amateurs (GT3 Pro-Am), and a class for gentleman drivers who use cars at least one year old (GT3 Am). The FIA's ranking system for drivers is utilized in determining what class each entry is eligible for. The GT4 category remained its own class.[1]

For the 2012 season, the GT4 and Supersport category were dropped and the GT3 Citation class was modified into the Gentlemen class.[2] In 2013, grids have reached 60 cars for regular races.

The series uses extensive performance balancing and handicap weights to equalise the cars' performance.

Champions

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Drivers

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Year Pro Cup (2011–2015)
Overall (2016–present)
Silver Cup Gold Cup Pro-Am Cup Gentlemen Trophy (2011–2014)
Am Cup (2015–2020)
Bronze Cup (2022-present)
GT4
2011   Greg Franchi Not held Not held   Niek Hommerson
  Louis Machiels
  Georges Cabannes   Alex Buncombe
  Jordan Tresson
  Christopher Ward
2012   Christopher Haase
  Christopher Mies
  Stéphane Ortelli
  Niek Hommerson
  Louis Machiels
  Pierre Hirschi
  Robert Hissom
Not held
(discontinued)
2013   Maximilian Buhk   Lucas Ordóñez   Jean-Luc Beaubelique
  Jean-Luc Blanchemain
  Patrice Goueslard
2014   Laurens Vanthoor   Stefano Gai
  Andrea Rizzoli
  Francisco Guedes
  Peter Mann
2015   Alex Buncombe
  Katsumasa Chiyo
  Wolfgang Reip
  Duncan Cameron
  Matt Griffin
  Ian Loggie
  Julian Westwood
2016   Rob Bell
  Côme Ledogar
  Shane van Gisbergen
  Alessandro Bonacini
  Michał Broniszewski
  Andrea Rizzoli
  Vadim Gitlin
  Liam Talbot
  Marco Zanuttini
2017   Mirko Bortolotti
  Andrea Caldarelli
  Christian Engelhart
  Jonathan Adam
  Ahmad Al Harthy
  Jacques Duyver
  David Perel
  Marco Zanuttini
2018   Yelmer Buurman
  Maro Engel
  Luca Stolz
  Alex Fontana
  Mikaël Grenier
  Adrian Zaugg
  Chris Buncombe
  Nick Leventis
  Lewis Williamson
  Adrian Amstutz
  Leo Machitski
2019   Andrea Caldarelli
  Marco Mapelli
  Nico Bastian
  Timur Boguslavskiy
  Felipe Fraga
  Ahmad Al Harthy
  Charlie Eastwood
  Salih Yoluç
  Adrian Amstutz
  Leo Machitski
2020   Alessandro Pier Guidi   Patrick Kujala
  Alex MacDowall
  Frederik Schandorff
  Chris Goodwin
  Alexander West
  Stéphane Tribaudini
2021   Alessandro Pier Guidi
  Nicklas Nielsen
  Côme Ledogar
  Alex Fontana
  Ricardo Feller
  Rolf Ineichen
  Chris Froggatt
  Jonathan Hui
Not held
2022   Jules Gounon
  Daniel Juncadella
  Raffaele Marciello
  Benjamin Goethe
  Thomas Neubauer
  Jean-Baptiste Simmenauer
  Oliver Millroy
  Frederik Schandorff
  Brendan Iribe
  Louis Machiels
  Andrea Bertolini
  Stefano Costantini
  Reema Juffali
  Tim Müller
  Valentin Pierburg
  George Kurtz
Year Pro Cup (2011–2015)
Overall (2016–present)
Gold Cup Silver Cup Bronze Cup Pro-Am Cup GT4
2023   Jules Gounon
  Timur Boguslavskiy
  Raffaele Marciello
  Nicolas Baert
  Maxime Soulet
  Benjamín Hites
  Clemens Schmid
  Glenn van Berlo
  Eddie Cheever III
  Chris Froggatt
  Jonathan Hui
  Alex Fontana
  Ivan Jacoma
  Nicolas Leutwiler
Not held
(discontinued)

Teams

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Year Pro Cup (2011–2015)
Overall (2016–present)
Silver Cup Gold Cup Pro-Am Cup Gentlemen Trophy (2011–2014)
Am Cup (2015–2020)
Bronze Cup (2022-present)
GT4
2011   Belgian Audi Club Not held Not held   Vita4One   Ruffier Racing   RJN Motorsport
2012   Belgian Audi Club Team WRT   AF Corse   Saintéloc Racing Not held
(discontinued)
2013   Marc VDS Racing Team   Nissan GT Academy Team RJN   SOFREV Auto Sport Promotion
2014   Belgian Audi Club Team WRT   Scuderia Villorba Corse   AF Corse
2015   Belgian Audi Club Team WRT   AF Corse   AKKA ASP
2016   Garage 59   Kessel Racing   Kessel Racing
2017   Bentley Team M-Sport   Oman Racing Team with TF Sport   Kessel Racing
2018   (Mercedes-AMG Team) Black Falcon   961 Corse /   AF Corse   Barwell Motorsport
2019   Orange1 FFF Racing Team   AKKA ASP Team   Oman Racing with TF Sport   Barwell Motorsport
2020   AF Corse   Barwell Motorsport   Garage 59   CMR
2021   Team WRT   Emil Frey Racing   Sky - Tempesta Racing Not held
2022   AKKodis ASP Team   Team WRT   Inception Racing   SPS Automotive Performance   SPS Automotive Performance
Year Pro Cup (2011–2015)
Overall (2016–present)
Gold Cup Silver Cup Bronze Cup Pro-Am Cup GT4
2023   AKKodis ASP Team   Comtoyou Racing   GRT Grasser Racing Team   Sky – Tempesta Racing   Car Collection Motorsport

See also

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References

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  1. ^ "The new GT Endurance Series in detail!". planetlemans.com. 2010-11-03. Archived from the original on 2010-11-12. Retrieved 2010-11-03.
  2. ^ "2012 Blancpain Endurance Series Presentation (english)". SRO. 2012. Archived from the original on 2012-03-21. Retrieved 2012-03-20. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
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