There will be just six drivers who will have to split their commitments between the World Endurance Championship and the GT World Challenge Europe over the weekend, amid an unexpected clash between the two series.
As has been known for some time, SRO Motorsports Group had brought forward the 3-Portimao hour race – counting as the final round of the 2026 Endurance Cup season – to Saturday evening, so as to allow all the key drivers also competing in the world championship to travel back and forth between Spain and Portugal, bearing in mind that – at the time these decisions were made – the title races were still wide open.
Teams and manufacturers organised themselves according to the championship standings as set out by Stephane Ratel’s organisation, and the only request made to the WEC and the ACO was to amend the schedule at the Circuit de Barcelona-Catalunya, splitting the programme to give priority to LMGT3 cars before making way for the Hypercars.
With the publication of the two entry lists, we now have a complete picture of the situation and, as expected, it is all the LMGT3 entrants who will be heading to the Algarve International Circuit for the race on Saturday 17th.
Amongst these, Mattia Drudi certainly stands out; as an official Aston Martin Racing driver, he will first have to defend the colours of Heart of Racing at the wheel of the #27 Vantage LMGT3, before changing overalls to race for Comtoyou Racing in the GT World Challenge in the #7 Vantage, where, in place of regular driver Marco Sorensen (who remains in the Valkyrie for the WEC), the British manufacturer has fielded Ross Gunn, with Nicki Thiim completing the trio.
#10 Garage 59 McLaren 720s GT3 EVO: Antares Au, Thomas Fleming, Marvin Kirchhofer
Photo by: FIA WEC / DPPI
Those most ‘affected’ by this scheduling clash are the McLaren drivers and the Garage 59 team: Thomas Fleming and Benjamin Goethe will first drive the #10 and #58 McLaren 720S LMGT3s, respectively, before flying to Portugal to share the wheel of the #58 Gold Cup Class car with Louis Prette. The British manufacturer has, however, ‘spared’ Marvin Kirchhofer, whose place in the #59 PRO CUP 720S at the Algarve will be taken by Jack Hawksworth, who will line up alongside regulars Dean Macdonald and Joseph Loake.
At BMW, Darren Leung will also have to juggle commitments between the #32 M4 LMGT3 entered by WRT in the WEC and the #991 Bavarian GT3 of his Paradine Competition team, with which he competes in the Bronze Cup category of the SRO series.
The same applies to the legendary Peter Dempsey, who, incidentally, is actually switching cars: in Spain, the Irish veteran will drive the #34 TF Sport Corvette, whilst in Portugal he will be at the wheel of the #93 Tempesta Racing Porsche Racing, with which he has just won the Sprint title in the Bronze Cup.
There is also a sixth competitor who was not initially among the potential candidates for the so-called ‘double’: Rui Andrade, who drives for Iron Lynx-Mercedes in the WEC and has been called up by the Motopark team to drive the #19 AMG GT3 in the Silver Cup at Portimao.
All the other complicated situations have been resolved as follows. The most significant news, as has been known for several days now, is Formula 1 star Max Verstappen’s decision to take to the track in his own team’s #3 Mercedes, given that Daniel Juncadella and Jules Gounon will remain with Genesis and Alpine respectively in Barcelona. Alongside Chris Lulham, the Red Bull driver will be joined by Ben Barnicoat, who has close ties to the 2Seas Motorsport team responsible for running the Mercedes-AMG GT3.
Maxime Martin will also remain with Iron Lynx-Mercedes in the LMGT3 class of the world championship, with Ralf Aron set to replace him in the #17 GetSpeed Performance car in the GT World PRO category.
Ferrari and AF Corse have sorted things out without too much trouble: as they are no longer in contention for the GT World Pro titles, Nicklas Nielsen and Alessio Rovera will retain their roles in the 499P and 296 LMGT3s, with Lorenzo Ferrari and Nicola Lacorte stepping in for them in Portimao in the #51 296 Pro entry.
#93 Ziggo Sport Tempesta Racing, Porsche 911 GT3 R (992) EVO: Eddie Cheever, Peter Dempsey
Photo by: Davide Cavazza
Sean Gelael will not be able to drive the #50 car from Maranello after all, as he is competing in LMGT3 with WRT-BMW. As a result, Albert Costa has been chosen to partner regular drivers Lilou Wadoux and Arthur Leclerc.
And speaking of BMW M, things have also been sorted out quickly here, with Raffaele Marciello staying in the #15 M Hybrid V8 and Dan Harper and Augusto Farfus in WRT’s #69 and #32 M4s in LMGT3.
At the Algarve, the Swiss champion and the Brazilian’s seats in Rowe Racing’s #98 M4 will be taken by Philipp Eng and Marco Wittmann to support Jake Dennis; the Briton will hand over the wheel of the #46 M4 to Neil Verhagen, the new team-mate of Valentino Rossi and Max Hesse.
Finally, Antares Au and Riccardo Pera will remain in Spain with Garage 59 McLaren and Manthey Porsche. Consequently, Rutronik Racing has decided not to field its #97 911 in the Bronze Cup for SRO’s final endurance race.
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