The season is entering a decisive phase across several championships, with Ferrari at the forefront. In the United States, the IMSA series resumes at Road America. In Europe, wheels will be on the track in France for the GT World Challenge Europe Sprint Cup, at Imola for the Italian GT Endurance Championship, and at Silverstone for the GT Cup Championship. Meanwhile, in the Far East, the Japan GT takes place at Fuji Speedway.

IMSA. Ferrari takes double momentum into this weekend’s SportsCar Grand Prix at Road America, returning as winner of the 2024 event while coming off a GTD Pro victory in the most recent IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship race at Canadian Tire Motorsport Park. DragonSpeed came from the last starting position to win at Mosport with Giacomo Altoé and Albert Costa racing the No. 81 Ferrari 296 GT3 - Ferrari’s first victory of the campaign. The team continues its full-season challenge in the GTD Pro division at Road America, while Conquest Racing, Inception Racing and Triarsi Competizione have single-car Ferrari 296 GT3 entries in the GTD Pro-Am category. Altoé and Costa took advantage of superior fuel mileage at Mosport. A pair of late incidents enabled them to skip a final pit stop, with the event ending under caution. Costa is third in the GTD Pro standings, 53 points in arrears. He finished second with Altoe at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca and was also third at Sebring International Raceway in March and Watkins Glen International last month.

Fuel mileage similarly played a role for Ferrari at Road America last year, with Altoe joining factory driver Daniel Serra in the winning No. 35 Ferrari 296 GT3 – a one-off GTD Pro effort for Conquest Racing. Serra returns to Conquest this weekend in the No. 34 Ferrari 296 GT3, joining Milwaukee native Manny Franco. Two years ago, Franco made history with Ferrari at Road America after scoring the first victories for the new 296 GT3 in North American competition, sweeping the SRO weekend with Alessandro Balzan and the Conquest team. Last year, the Franco finished fifth in GTD, co-driving with Costa. Triarsi Competizione sees Onofrio Triarsi join Kenton Koch in the No. 021 Ferrari of Central Florida Ferrari 296 GT3. They paired for the first time at Mosport, finishing seventh after coming back from an opening-lap incident. Owner/driver Triarsi also has a winning record at Road America, capturing weekend sweeps in SRO competition in both 2021 and 2022. He made his IMSA sprint debut at Elkhart Lake last season, leading the race en route to a 12th-place finish.

Inception Racing continues its full-season effort with the No. 70 Ferrari for Brendan Iribe and Frederik Schandorff. The duo led Ferrari’s GTD effort at Mosport, finishing sixth on the heels of a second-place result in the Six Hours of Watkins Glen.

Round 8 of the championship brings together all four IMSA classes in the two hour, 40-minute race. The event opens with a 90-minute practice session on Friday, August 1 at 2 p.m. (all times CT). Saturday includes a second 90-minute practice at 9:05 a.m. followed by GTD qualifying at 4:40 p.m. and GTD Pro qualifying at 5:05 p.m. The two-hour, 40-minute race begins at 1:10 p.m. on Sunday, August 3.

GT World Challenge Europe. The penultimate round of the Sprint Cup season will take place at the Magny-Cours circuit in France’s Burgundy region. With 40 cars on the track and just two weeks since the Misano round, all championship titles remain up for grabs.
In the Pro class, the number 51 AF Corse – Francorchamps Motors 296 GT3, crewed by official driver Alessio Rovera and Vincent Abril, remains in contention for the overall title. After their great result in Italy, the pairing are now just 16 points behind the leader. AF Corse – Francorchamps Motors will also have another car in the same class on the track, the number 50, with an all-French line-up of official drivers Thomas Neubauer and Arthur Leclerc. Kessel Racing will also be on the Pro class grid, fielding the number 14 with Konsta Lappalainen and Ben Green.

In the Gold class, Thierry Vermeulen and Chris Lulham go into the weekend at the head of the standings by 14 points. They will take the wheel of the number 69 296 GT3 for Emil Frey Racing. After retiring from Race-1 at Misano, the pair won Race-2.
In the Silver class, the Italian-Belgian AF Corse – Francorchamps Motors team will enter a third car, the number 52, driven by Jef Machiels and Marcos Siebert. Both drivers aim to bounce back from a tough weekend in Italy.

In the Bronze class, the leaders of the rankings Dustin Blattner and Dennis Marschall will be in the number 74 Kessel Racing Ferrari, which won in Race-1 at Misano. A ninth-place finish in Race-2, however, means the title race is still open. Also in the Bronze class, the number 93 Ferrari from Ziggo Sport Tempesta, crewed by Eddie Cheever and Marco Pulcini, completes the seven-car Ferrari line-up for the event.

Italian GT Championship. The 3 Hours of Imola this weekend at the “Enzo e Dino Ferrari” circuit is the halfway mark of the Endurance class season. Forty-one cars are set to start across the GT3 and GT Cup categories, including 15 Ferraris.

AF Corse will race three cars in the GT3 class, including the number 62 296 GT3 of Leonardo Colavita, Ibrahim Badawi, and Ajenjo David Vidales, who currently lead both the overall and Pro Am standings. Lorenzo Ferrari, Mahaveer Raghunathan and Riccardo Ponzio will compete in the number 51 Ferrari in the Pro Am class, while Christoph Ulrich, Edoardo Borelli and Simon Ashley Mann will drive the number 50 car in the Am category. Still in contention for the Pro Am title, Luigi Coluccio, Leonardo Gorini, and Carlo Tamburini will take the wheel of the number 98 296 GT3 for Easy Race. The number 74 Rossocorsa Ferrari, with Stefano Marazzi and Samuele Buttarelli, will also compete in the Am class, along with the number 3 488 GT3 from Pellin Racing, driven by Paolo Ruberti and Tarje Haugen.

The Prancing Horse will also feature highly in the GT Cup. In the 1st Division Pro Am class, current leaders of the rankings Fabrizio Fontana and Stefano Gai will be on the track in the number 169 296 Challenge for AF Corse. The Piacenza-based team will also enter the number 151 car, shared by Leonardo Megna, Edoardo Barbolini, and Vincenzo Scarpetta, and the number 107 driven by Andreas Bogh-Sorensen and Mikkel Mac. Rossocorsa will field the number 187 with Niccolò Maddalena and Matteo Cairoli, while Best Lap will enter two cars: the number 111 with Sabatino Di Mare, Filippo Croccolino and Pietro Pio Agoglia, and the number 219 in the Am class with Andrea Levy, Ivan David Mari and Mattia Bucci.

In the 2nd Division, the number 403 Ferrari 488 Challenge from Easy Race will compete in the Pro Am class with Lorenzo Bontempelli, Diego Di Fabio, and Vito Postiglione at the steering wheel. In the Am category, the number 552 488 Challenge from Reparto Corse RAM will be driven by Mattia Simonini and Giacomo Parisotto, while Dublett will enter the number 577 with Matteo Marulla, Dawid Zydlewski, and Nicholas Risitano.

The third round of the Endurance series will kick off on Friday with two 60-minute free practice sessions. A third free practice session is scheduled for Saturday morning, from 9 to 10 a.m., followed by qualifying in the afternoon, which begins at 1.20 p.m. and includes three 10-minute sessions for each class. These sessions will determine the starting grid for the three-hour race, set for Sunday at 3.30 p.m.

GT Cup Championship. The fourth round of the British series will be held at the Silverstone circuit, with two Ferraris on track to represent the Maranello brand. Marcos Viviani and Francesco Castellacci will be at the steering wheel of the number 128 296 GT3 from AF Corse in the GT3 class. In the GTC class, Lone Wolf Racing will be on the track with the number 888 488 Challenge, shared by John Turner and Ray Grimes.
Three races will be contested over the weekend: two 25-minute sprint races on Saturday, 2 August, starting at 1.30 p.m. and 4.40 p.m., and one endurance race, the GT Cup “100,” lasting 100 minutes, beginning on Sunday, 3 August, at 1.10 p.m.

Super GT. Round four of the Japanese championship will take place at Fuji Speedway and marks the first sprint event of the season. Two races will run over the weekend: the first over 35 laps (about 160 km and roughly 1 hour), and the second a timed event of 50 minutes (roughly 25 laps and 115 km). As with the endurance rounds of the championship, each crew will have two drivers, with each driver racing in one of the two sprint races.
Three Ferraris will compete in the GT300 class. In the number 6 296 GT3 entered by Velorex, Roberto Merhi Muntan and Yoshiaki Katayama, who is currently fifth in the overall standings, will take turns at the wheel. Rikuto Kobayashi and Zak O’Sullivan will drive the number 7 entry from CarGuy Mks Racing, while Takuro Shinoara and Kei Cozzolino will share the number 45.
The first qualifying session is scheduled for Saturday, 2 August at 11.40 a.m., with Race-1 starting at 3.15 p.m. Qualifying for Race-2 will be held on Sunday, 3 August at 11 a.m., followed by the race at 2.15 p.m.