29 November 2018
Sakhir, 29 November 2018 - The first edition of the FIA GT Nations Cup, organised in conjunction with the SRO Motorsports, will be held at the Bahrain International Circuit on Friday and Saturday. There are nine Ferrari two-driver crews that will be involved in two qualifying sessions, two qualifying races of sixty minutes each, and a third and final race of sixty minutes to determine the overall winners.
For Silver and Bronze drivers only. The event is open for drivers classified as either Silver or Bronze and holding a minimum of a Race International C license. Each crew must hold a passport of the country that they are representing, and a maximum of one Silver driver is permitted per crew.
The teams. AF Corse will be fielding two cars for Japan and Italy teams. On the Japanese car Ken Seto will race alongside Tamotsu Kondo, both former Ferrari Challenge drivers. The Italian team car will be crewed by Piergiuseppe Perazzini and Marco Cioci that raced together for the entire season in the Le Mans Cup. Supported by the Italian team will also be the crews representing Mexico, Denmark and Belarus. Squadra Corse Garage Italia will field a 488 GT3 for Martin Fuentes and Ricardo Perez de Lara; Formula Racing, the team that dominated Ferrari Challenge Europe in 2018, will prepare its Ferrari for Johnny Lauren and Ferrari Challenge new champion Nicklas Nielsen, while AT Racing will be fielding a car for Belarus’ Alexander Talkanitsa senior and junior. In the AF Corse garage will also be the British team made by Chris Froggatt, another Ferrari Challenge star, and Chris Buncombe.
Rinaldi and Kessel. Swiss team Kessel Racing will field the car that raced in the 2018 Blancpain GT Sprint Cup for Piti Bhirombhakdi and Carlo Van Dam but the place of the Dutch driver will be taken by Pasin Lathouras to form the mandatory two-driver team of the same nation, Thailand. Germany and Russia teams will be supported by Rinaldi Racing. In the German car Alexander Mattschull, who raced in the no. 333 Ferrari 488 GT3 for the entire Blancpain Endurace Cup season, will driver alongside Nico Bastian while the Russian team will be made by Rinat Salikhov and Denis Bulatov.
Schedule. Qualifying for all the races are on Friday at 4.05 pm local time (12.05 CET) while Race-1 will start under the floodlights at 7.30 pm (5.30 pm CET). On Saturday Race-2 will be at 1.15 pm (11.15 am CET). The main race will start at 7.30 pm (5.30 pm CET).