Hankook 24 hours Dubai 2019 Preview

The 14th edition of the 24 hours of Dubai see’s 8 Different marque’s taking to the top class to battle it out for the overall win. As well as a tasty looking TCE race between the TCR cars and SP3 machines. Nearly 80 cars entered combined between GT and TCE.

Black Falcon return after claiming their 4th overall win in the twice around the clock desert classic last year, this years edition could see the AMG squad equal Porsches’s win record of 5 overall wins. They field two AMG GT3’s in the race with 2 incredibly strong line ups for both cars featuring 5 of the 8 most successful drivers in this race’s short history. They enter every year as a strong favourite but you’d have a hard time finding a strong outfit to take the win.

Mercedes Dominated the A6 class last year also taking the A6-AM class win too with SPS Automotive, that squad doesn’t return for the 2019 race but the GT championship winner’s do return all be it under a new Banner. CP Racing enter with the same lineup and new to the series Shane Lewis, who bolsters the AM side up and relieves some driving time pressure from the others over the 24 hours giving them a all American line up for one of the toughest races on the calendar. This race last year saw the worst finish for the team, so you can no doubt bet they will be wanting to correct that mistake.
Mercedes look to overpower the other marques once again as they have supported 5 teams with 6 cars in the A6 class.

Audi come with reinforcements this year, by far the most represented marque in the top class with 8 cars over 5 teams. WRT come to spearhead that attack. They took the win in 2016 and it remains the only time an Audi has won this race. With 8 Audi R8 LMS on track a combination of the old and new evo version, they are a real powerhouse this year and are certainly looking like wanting to claim this place for themselves. Most Notable after WRT is the Car Collection squad, fielding 3 cars in total and one might line up in their pro car.
Attempto racing make a return this year, they have ditched their Porsche and then their Lamborghini from last year and return after a hugely successful season in the blancpain series in their Audi R8 LMS. They come armed with 2 brand new 2019 Versions of the car and 2 mighty line ups for both machines.

Porsche return lead by the Herberth Motorsport outfit, old heads in this game and proven when they won this race in 2017. Accompanied by only 2 other Porsche asked teams this year from Team Porsche Centre Hong Kong in their A6-AM entry as well as local boys from GP Extreme who have acquired a Porsche 991 GT3 R. GP Extreme had a great run with their Renault RS.01 but with lack of developments on the car it was certainly becoming slower than a modern GT3 machine.

For 2 years now, Lamborghini have been the stronghold against the German machinery, GRT have always put up a big fight against the German might but drop down to a single car effort for this year in what could be one of the last outings for the team in their old Huracán before the EVO version takes over in Daytona in a few weeks.
2 years on and a Ferrari returns to the Dubai Autodrome. Scuderia Praha return after a hiatus from the event, regulars to the series for the last 2 years see them still a top team but an event that hasn’t been kind to Ferrari machinery is somewhat daunting to some and almost seems like a curse against the prancing horse.

2016 was also the last time we saw a Nissan entered into the top A6 Class, but once again that all changes this year as KCMG have entered 2 Nissan GT-R GT3 into the A6-Pro class with some very strong line up’s featuring Oliver Jarvis, Alexandre Imperatori, Katsumasa Chiyo and Tsugio Matsuda. Spread these guys across 2 cars and you’ve got 2 forceful lineups you don’t want to mess with.

The A6 Pro and A6 AM class have a combined 24 are entered, 19 of these are German machines which you can see why this race is dominated by German marques. The non German Machines entered though are some incredibly strong teams and proven squads, so with all that said could this be the year that we finally see the German strong hold broken on this race?

The TCE race makes its second start for its overall winner too, Last year’s winners Liqui Moly Team Engstler claimed the victory in 2018 with a faultless run setting them apart from the field. 2019 doesn’t see the squad return, so who will claim the TCE race victory?

Bas Koeten returns to the TCE field with 2 Audi RS3 LMS TCR cars, they’ve chopped in their Cupra TCR cars for the longer shape silhouette Audi with the same power unit. Bas Koeten always fields a strong entry and maintains a tight ship so looking over last seasons results they are certainly shaping up to be serious contenders for this race win.
Creventic race stalwarts Red Camel-Jordans.NL return in a brand new Cupra TCR for the 2019 race. Ivo Breukers leads the team with Semi-Pro Cody Hill backing up the pace.

In SP3 the closest class to the TCR machines see’s CWS Engineering lead the attack with their Ginetta G55. Colin White brings his well drilled outfit over to attack the 24 hours once again after the huge success they had hear last year before race incidents took their toll on the car and the car dropped back.
Sp3 only see’s two other entries, one being a Porsche Cayman GT4 CS from Swiss outfit Amag First Centri Porsche Ticino with their first entry into the twice around the clock classic.
Vortex V8 return this year with a scirocco silhouette shaped machine, the first time we’ve seen one of these machines since 2016 in this event so a nice addition to the field.

Qualifying runs Thursday night for the big race.

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