Nevermind The Bollocks.... Here Comes FIA GT3!

 More pressure on the USCR to accept FIA GT3 and I think its working.... Pirelli World Challenge Series announced  two weeks ago, they would allow full FIA GT3's into the series next year, no changes.

 Bentley has stated publicly on two occasions, here at official public showing at the Goodwood Festival of Speed and here on Racer via Marshall Pruett; That they would NOT build a version of their new GT3 car just for US regulations. 

 That means the trial balloon that Scot Elkins launched in a press release to John Dagys and said in an interview with Leo Parente on Drive/Shakedown that FIA GT3 cars would be balanced to current Porsche Cup performance, caused Porsche NA to also play the press release game by announcing a US only Porsche GT3 Cup "America". Of course that was a fishing expedition, I wonder how many interested parties have contacted them?

 Its very likely that the USCR will also accept unmodified FIA GT3 cars (ie: No Spec Wing), they MAY get a air restrictor but I don't think the data set I have supports that. Even if the FIA spec Audi R8 GT3 LMS Ultra as tested by Brad Kettler (Audio Customer Sports NA) is four seconds a lap faster than the Grand Am spec car, it still 2-3 seconds slower than the other classes.

 For the teams currently in the GT class of World Challenge that run non-FIA GT3 cars (Cadillac, Volvo and the Porsche Cup) their cars have Traction Control and/or ABS already. 

 The Volvo being AWD is not legal for any FIA/SRO run series. But the Cadillac could possibly be homologated as Cadillacs are sold in Europe and the CTS-V's direct market competition is BMW (M3) and Mercedes Benz (C63).

 Memo to the brass at GM:

 Why not?

 With North America finally getting on the FIA GT3 bandwagon it opens up possibilities for the USRC which has lost all its momentum after its announcement last year. The slow drip of rules and regulations has not helped because many teams really want to compete in the series next season but want to know what the regulations will be for each class.

 The main question marks are:

• Daytona Prototype BoP vs ACO P2
• Adjustments to FIA GT3 cars

 We'll focus on GT3 cars because I don't find the new class structure for Prototypes all that exciting, it's often not even the best race on-track.

 You are about to see an explosion of GT3 cars in America and many teams will run both World Challenge AND the USRC, especially when the Le Mans break comes up. So it's KEY for Scot Elkins and the braintrust at USRC to just allow FIA GT3 cars as-is with MAYBE a air restrictor to slow them down.

 This will save the teams money and I am not one usually to say something like this. But the fewer changes that have to be made between teams that want to run World Challenge or European teams that may come over to run Daytona or Sebring, the better.

 The potential for both series grids to be huge just got a massive boost.

 Right now both ALMS & Grand Am are averaging between 30-32 entries for the shorter races (24 for Grand Am in Kansas) that make up the majority of the season. 

 John Dagys who currently blogs for Foxsports/Speed says to expect 35-45 full season entries in the new series.

 But didn't I just say both series (Grand Am and ALMS) average 30-32 entries per event save for Sebring, Daytona? Put another way, that's 60-64 cars if you combined both fields since no Rolex GT cars have run in the ALMS this season.

 How does it get pared down to 35-45 cars? 

 Read how here