Overall victory in the opening round of the 2022 Fanatec GT World Challenge Powered by AWS went to the #32 Team WRT Audi R8 LMS evo II GT3 piloted by Kelvin van der Linde, Charles Weerts and, taking the chequered flag, Dries Vanthoor. Vanthhoor crossed the line just over six seconds ahead of Jules Gounon in the #88 Mercedes AMG AKKODIS ASP Team Mercedes-AMG GT3, Gounon sharing the driving duties with Dani Juncadella and Raffaele Marciello.
Completing the overall podium places was the #2 AMG Team GetSpeed Mercedes of Maro Engel, Steijn Schothorst and, at the wheel for the final stint, Luca Stolz.
WRT made it double win at Imola when the #30 Team WRT Audi took victory in the Silver Cup class, Thomas Neubauer taking the chequered flag in the car he shared with Benjamin Goethe and Jean-Baptiste Simmenauer. Second in the Silver Cup category went to the #99 Attempto Racing Audi driven by Marius Zug, Nicolas Scholl and Alex Aka. The #777 Al Manar Racing by HRT Mercedes completed the top three in class.
Class honours in the new Gold Cup category went to the #911 Herberth Motorsport Porsche 911 GT3-R while the #20 SPS automotive performance Mercedes won the Pro-Am class.
“Yeah, it was an awesome race”” said Kelvin van der Linde. “Thanks to the team. It was a long winter. We had some tests and we were like ‘man, we need to find a bit of lap time’. Even yesterday, before the qualifying we were a bit unsure where we were and then this morning from qualifying onwards it went like a dream to thanks to my teammates and the whole team.”
Full race report to follow.
