SEBRING, Florida – Carrying the momentum of a breakout and historic victory in the season-opening Rolex 24 At Daytona, Mercedes-AMG Motorsport Customer Racing teams seek additional endurance race success this weekend in the 69th running of the 12 Hours of Sebring at Sebring International Raceway. Two Mercedes-AMG GT3 teams will attempt to secure the second-straight endurance victory of the season in Saturday’s IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship 12 Hours of Sebring. In Friday’s featured event on the 3.74-mile Sebring circuit, four Mercedes-AMG GT4 entries compete in the two-hour IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge race.
In January at Daytona International Speedway (DIS), Winward Racing and team co-drivers Russell Ward, Indy Dontje, Maro Engel and Philip Ellis earned the first Rolex 24 win for the Mercedes-AMG GT3 in the GTD (GT Daytona) class. The victory, in Winward’s only planned GTD start this season, remarkably came in the team’s IMSA WeatherTech Championship debut.
Engel drove the winning Winward Racing entry across the finish line just ahead of the No. 75 SunEnergy1 Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3, anchoring a one-two Mercedes-AMG Motorsport Customer Racing finish in North America’s premier 24-hour endurance.
With Winward shifting focus this weekend solely to its season-long IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge Mercedes-AMG GT4 program with Ward and Dontje, two other Rolex 24 contenders will carry the Mercedes-AMG Motorsport customer racing flag in Saturday’s 12 Hours of Sebring.
Meanwhile, Engel steps into the No. 75 SunEnergy1 Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 at Sebring to co-drive with Kenny Habul and Mikael Grenier.
The other Mercedes-AMG GT3 competing Saturday at Sebring is season-long IMSA GTD entrants Alegra Motorsports, which made it three Mercedes-AMG GT3 in the top-10 in the Rolex 24. The No. 28 Alegra Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3 team looks to improve on its ninth-place Daytona finish at Sebring with co-drivers Daniel Morad, Michael de Quesada and Billy Johnson.
The 12 Hours of Sebring is scheduled to start this Saturday, March 20, at 10:10 a.m. EDT. Live coverage airs on the NBC Sports Network (NBCSN) for the opening hours of the race at 10 a.m. EDT and picks up again on NBCSN at 7 p.m. EDT straight through to the race finish. Flag-to-flag coverage is available in the U.S. on TrackPass on NBC Sports Gold and the NBC Sports App with authentication. International viewers can watch live at www.IMSA.tv.
The four-strong Mercedes-AMG GT4 effort in the top-tier Grand Sport (GS) class in Michelin Pilot Challenge was led by Ward and Dontje at Daytona, who return at Sebring in the No. 4 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT4.
Ward and Dontje ran in contention for the win throughout the race only to be hampered by a late-race caution that didn’t work with the team’s strategy.
Dontje made up as much ground as he could in the closing minutes and took the checkered flag in eighth place before time ran out.
The No. 56 Murillo Racing Mercedes-AMG GT4 of Jeff Mosing and Eric Foss also contended early at Daytona, leading three race laps before being spun out of contention. The contact ultimately led to a retirement at Daytona, but the No. 56 team expects to return to front-of-the-pack form at Sebring.
Mosing and Foss team at Sebring with the Murillo Racing sister No. 65 Mercedes-AMG GT4 entry driven by Brent Mosing and Tim Probert.
The fourth Mercedes-AMG GT4 set for Sebring this week is the No. 10 LAP Motorsports/Bluff City Racing entry co-driven by Anton Dias Perera and Scott Andrews.
The Michelin Pilot Challenge two-hour race is scheduled to start Friday at 2:35 p.m. EDT. Live streaming on TrackPass on NBC Sports Gold in the U.S. begins at 2:30 p.m. EDT with free streaming available to international audiences at www.IMSA.tv.
Maro Engel, Driver – No. 75 SunEnergy1 Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3: “I am absolutely looking forward to getting back to Sebring. My only previous start there was a few years ago in LMPC, so I am looking forward to my first outing in a Mercedes-AMG GT3. Sebring is a tough test for man and machine. It’s extremely bumpy but a great track, a driver’s track as they call it. It’s definitely a track where the Mercedes-AMG GT3 is well suited and performs well, so we will look to build on that. It’s great to be back racing with Kenny and Mikael, they ran a great race at Daytona as well, but when it was clear Winward was going to stick with their plan of running only the one race at Daytona, the opportunity came up to run with SunEnergy1. We will push hard for a strong result which will help Mercedes-AMG with the constructor championship and the SunEnergy1 team in the endurance cup.”
Billy Johnson, Driver – No. 28 Alegra Motorsports Mercedes-AMG GT3: “I’m really looking forward to Sebring. It’s great to finally be driving for Alegra in the 12 hour which was actually the first race I was scheduled to do with the team years ago. The whole team showed a lot of potential at Daytona and we look to carry that momentum into a strong result at Sebring.”
Indy Dontje, Driver – No. 4 Winward Racing Mercedes-AMG GT4: “Of course, it’s a shame not to be in GTD at Sebring, but this was our plan at the beginning of the year. We want to fight for the championship in GT4 and I think we have good chance. We just have to be smart and get points. Sebring suits me and Russell quite good so I think we can again fight in the front for the podium. At Daytona we did really well on strategy, but we were unlucky with safety car in the end. We performed well until that point. So, I have a good feeling for this weekend. The spirit in the team is of course great and we have to keep this momentum to continue this success.”
