40-plus cars confirmed for 2024 6H Abu Dhabi

The 41-car grid, one of the strongest in the event’s history heading into its fourth iteration, features former and reigning 24H SERIES champions, series newcomers keen to take on a new challenge, a debut for McLaren’s 720S GT3 Evo, and even an official works entry for Toyota.

On top of that, and as the championship fight in CREVENTIC’s three-round Middle East program begins to intensify, could the Hankook 6H ABU DHABI produce its fourth different winner, and its fourth different winning manufacturer, in a row in 2024?

CP Racing, Manamauri Energy by Ebimotors and Century Motorsport, which finished 1st, 2nd and 3rd overall at the 2023 Hankook 12H KUWAIT, have all confirmed entries for the Hankook 6H ABU DHABI as they continue their 24H SERIES Middle East Trophy championship fight in the United Arab Emirates.

2018 Overall GT Drivers’ champions Charles Putman, Charles Espenlaub and Joe Foster will compete alongside fellow 2023 GT3-Am Drivers’ champion Shane Lewis aboard the team’s Mercedes-AMG GT3. Ebimotors meanwhile, which finished a record-breaking half a second behind CP Racing in Kuwait, will again field reigning 992 Drivers’ ‘Europe’ champions Sabino de Castro and Sergiu Nicolae alongside 2021 991 Drivers’ champion Fabrizio Broggi and Cosimo Papi aboard the Romanian-Italian team’s Porsche 992 GT3 R.

Century Motorsport, last year’s GT4 Teams’ Middle East Trophy winner, similarly enters an unchanged driver line-up for the Hankook 6H ABU DHABI as Carl Cavers continues his partnership with Lewis Plato and Jack Barlow aboard the British team’s new BMW M4 GT3. Heading into round two of the 2023/2024 24H SERIES Middle East Trophy, CP Racing, Manamauri Energy by Ebimotors and Century Motorsport are separated by just eight points in the GT3 Teams’ standings.

Herberth Motorsport finished 2nd at last year’s Hankook 6H ABU DHABI by an amazingly slim 7.226 seconds, and will no doubt hope to go one better in 2024 with Alfred and Robert Renauer, and team staple Ralf Bohn aboard its 992-generation Porsche GT3 R. Similarly, Haas RT, which has confirmed a two-car line-up for Abu Dhabi, will hope to replicate, if not improve upon, its 3rd place overall at last year’s event. Stanislav Minsky, Thomas Kiefer, team prodigy Mathieu Detry, and last year’s Hankook 12H ESTORIL winner Torsten Kratz will pilot the team’s #21 Audi R8 LMS GT3 EVO II, while Masoud Jaberian and Edoardo Bacci have been confirmed for the Antiguan outfit’s new Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo. 

Several teams are set to make their 24H SERIES return on 20-21 January. Saalocin by Kox Racing, which finished 3rd overall in Abu Dhabi in 2022, most recently competed with CREVENTIC at the 2023 Hankook 24H DUBAI, and has confirmed team owner Peter Kox will drive alongside his daughter Stéphane van Poppel-Kox and long-time teammate Nico Pronk in its Porsche 991.2 GT3 R. ARC Bratislava took GT3-AM class victory at last year’s event after an impressive recovery drive from 20th on the grid, and will run team owner Miro Konopka alongside Slovakian compatriot Zdeno Mikulasko and the Czech Republic’s Petr Fulin in the Lamborghini Huracán GT3.

Attempto Racing meanwhile, a 15-year veteran of the Hankook 24H DUBAI, last competed at the Hankook 6H ABU DHABI in 2021, and even led outright during the early stages. The German team has confirmed Jef Machiels, team regular Alex Arkin Aka, and Florian Scholze, the latter of whom took GT3-Am victory on his most recent series outing at Dubai in 2021, will race its Audi R8 LMS GT3 EVO II.

New Zealand’s Grove Racing, back for its first 24H SERIES event since finishing 4thoverall at last year’s Hankook 24H DUBAI, will enter its Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo for Grove father and son Stephen and Brenton, and Australia’s Jordan Love.

Five-time Hankook 24H DUBAI class winner Dragon Racing will make its Hankook 6H ABU DHABI debut with one of its newly-acquired Ferrari 296 GT3s. The UAE team will do so with Andrew Gilbert and Fran Rueda, who lasted competed together with 7TSIX in Dubai in 2023.

Alongside its GT3 Ferrari, Dragon Racing will also field a Mercedes-AMG for series debutants Keith Gatehouse, Ramez Azzam and Denis Bulatov in the GT4 class.

Armenia’s Artur Goroyan and Roman Mavlanov, who took the TCR class win with Sharky-Racing at Yas Marina last year, will team up in one of two entries for Car Collection Motorsport at Yas Marina: Goroyan and Mavlanov will drive the Audi R8 LMS GT3 EVO II, while Dustin Blattner, Loek Hartog and Dennis Marschall will make their respective 24H SERIES debuts in the team’s new Porsche 992 GT3 R, which finished 5th on its maiden outing last year in Barcelona.

As the winner of the inaugural event in 2021, Car Collection Motorsport could potentially make history in 2024 by becoming the first team to win the Hankook 6H ABU DHABI more than once.

Britain’s Race Lab completes the GT3 field thus far, and will run Lucky Khera, Thomas Surgent and factory driver Euan Hankey – who makes his first 24H SERIES start since 2018 – aboard its McLaren 720S GT3 Evo, marking the first time Woking’s updated GT3 flagship will compete in an official 24H SERIES event.