GT3: Quality Grid Will Provide Action Packed Racing
While the GT3 class is currently led by double Road to Le Mans winners Tom Jackson and Ahmad Al Harthy, the Anglo-Omani teammates are not competing in Austria so all eyes will be on Monza race winners Lee Mowle and Phil Keen in the no7 Mercedes AMG to see if they regain the upperhand at the Red Bull Ring.
However with just 10 points covering the top four cars competing in Austria, it will not be easy to predict who will be leading the series on Saturday evening after the race.
The British team are currently on 29.5 points, 5.5 points ahead of Cedric Mezard and Steeve Hiesse in the SVC Sport Management Lamborghini Huracan which will be flying the Austrian flag above their paddock awning. The Austrian team scored their first podium of the season in the Saturday morning race in Le Mans last month.
Emanuele Busnelli and Fabio Babini in the no46 Ebimotors Lamborghini are just 0.5 points behind Mezard and Hiesse on 23.5 points, with Joe Osborne and Flick Haigh in the no75 Optimum Racing Audi R8 on 19.5 points.
The no95 Spirit of Race Ferrari F488 of Christoph Ulrich and Maurizio Mediani, who made their successful 2017 LMC debut in Le Mans with a good second place finish in the first race, will be lining up alongside the other five GT3 competitors in Austria, with Tom Onslow-Cole and Remon Vos in the no5 RAM Racing Mercedes completing the GT3 grid in Austria.
LMP3: Prototype Racing at its best
Fifteen cars will line up for the third event of the 2017 Michelin Le Mans Cup season with one race winning Norma M30 taking on the fourteen Ligier run by the other teams.
After taking their debuts in Le Mans, Marcello Marateotto and Marco Cencetti are back to race for the Austrian team SVC Sport Management in the no12 Ligier JS P3. Swiss duo Alexandre Coigny and Iradj Alexander also made their LMC debut in Le Mans and will join the party in Austria racing for French team Cool Racing by GPC.
After setting pole position in all three races held so far this year and claiming the top step of the podium in the feature race on Saturday morning at Le Mans last month, Belgium’s Jean Glorieux and Spain’s Alexander Toril are the leader of the LMP3 field in the no3 DKR Engineering Norma M30-Nissan.
The team from Luxembourg is currently 10 points ahead of Monza race winners Colin Noble and Tony Wells in the no79 Nielsen Racing Ligier-Nissan.
The driver line up in the no55 Spirit of Race Ligier was changed in Le Mans after the car finished on the podium in Monza with Maurizio Mediani, who is now racing in the no95 Ferrari, being replaced by fellow Italian Michele Rugolo alongside German Claudio Sdanewitsch.
