AWA – Syndication Server

AWA retains GTD lineup for 2025 IMSA season

AWA is set to continue into 2025 with an unchanged lineup in the No. 13 Orlando Corporation Corvette Z06 GT3.R in the GTD class. Toronto native Orey Fidani and British Pro driver Matt Bell will be resuming their roles as full-season teammates, once …

AWA is set to continue into 2025 with an unchanged lineup in the No. 13 Orlando Corporation Corvette Z06 GT3.R in the GTD class.

Toronto native Orey Fidani and British Pro driver Matt Bell will be resuming their roles as full-season teammates, once again accompanied by Lars Kern for the Michelin Endurance Cup rounds.

“It means a great deal to everyone at AWA to be returning to the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship for another season,” stated Team Owner Andrew Wojteczko. “It’s a privilege to be competing in such a high–caliber series in an incredibly competitive GTD field. Orey, Matt, and Lars are a great teammate pairing and work extremely well together, so we’re thrilled to be keeping the same lineup and focusing on our overall progression.

“We have big goals we are looking to achieve, and we greatly appreciate our relationship with Team Chevy as we continue to move forward together.”

Fidani and Bell scored their first top-five finish in the highly competitive GTD field at the most recent round at Road America. Fidani holds a narrow lead in the Bob Akin Award standings for the top Bronze-rated driver in GTD going into this weekend’s GT-only race at VIRginia International Raceway.

“I’m very excited to be returning to the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship with AWA,” declared Fidani. “I have been with this team since 2019, and I have grown so much with them as a driver over the years. I’m looking forward to another season in the GTD class with the Corvette.

“This year has been so important for us and we’ve learned a lot about the car throughout each round, with the help of GM and Chevrolet. We’re getting more and more competitive as we continue to progress, and I’m confident that 2025 will be even better.”

Fidani and Bell have been full-time partners since the 2023 season, when they paired up to finish third in the LMP3 standings in that class’s final year. They continued with the switch to GTD and 2025 will mark their third full season together.

“I’m really happy to be back with Orey, Lars and AWA next season,” added Bell. “The 2024 season has been a challenging one, but the way this group of people have come together and responded to the learning curve has been fantastic. I’ve been proud to be a part of it and the results are starting to show on track.

“Team Chevy and Pratt Miller have been great to work with and they have helped us enormously. I can’t wait to go into this next season with AWA and the Corvette.

“We are still focused on finishing out this current season on a good note before we go Rolex hunting in January. We are making a big push for the Bob Akin Award, which would allow us to make a special trip to France in the middle of next year’s IMSA season!”

With full-season entries already open for 2025, AWA took the opportunity to secure its spot on the grid for its second season as a customer team with the Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R, which made its debut in 2024. AWA was the first North American customer announced for Chevrolet’s first full GT3 program.

“We are excited to have AWA continue with the Corvette Z06 GT3.R for the 2025 WeatherTech SportsCar Championship,” noted Christie Bagne, Corvette Z06 GT3.R program manager. “By having the Corvette GT3 car for a second year, I’m confident that the learnings the team has gained this season will be advantageous for Orey, Matt and Lars, and will help them be even more competitive next year.”

The 2025 season begins as usual with the Roar Before the 24 and the Rolex 24 at Daytona in January.

Mantella lists Corvette Z06 GT3.R; AWA to have single car at Long Beach

Anthony Mantella appears to be calling time on his IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GTD effort with the new Corvette Z06 GT3.R run by AWA. After two DNFs in the first two races of the 2024 season, including an alternator issue at Sebring that …

Anthony Mantella appears to be calling time on his IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship GTD effort with the new Corvette Z06 GT3.R run by AWA.

After two DNFs in the first two races of the 2024 season, including an alternator issue at Sebring that left the car sidelined after only two laps, Mantella posted on Instagram that the Z06 GT3.R was for sale. Mantella made the switch with the AWA team from LMP3 to GTD for 2024 as AWA was selected as the first customer team in IMSA competition for Chevrolet’s first factory GT3 car.

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Mantella had Corvette factory pilot Nico Varrone, who was part of the WEC GTE-Am-winning trio for Corvette Racing in 2023, on board, along with Thomas Merrill for the endurance races and Charlie Eastwood at Daytona. The No. 17 Corvette completed 508 laps in the 24-hour race to the winning car’s 731 laps, 200 laps better than the No. 13 sister car did at Daytona. At Sebring, Orey Fidany, Matt Bell and Lars Kern finished ninth, on the same lap as winners Winward Racing.

The best finish for the factory-supported Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports team has been a fifth in the Rolex 24 at Daytona, seven laps down from the winning car in GTD PRO.

The post by @mantella_autosport read, “Imsa spec GTD Corvette Race car for sale. Used very infrequently. Hasn’t finished a race. Perfect for the collector who wants the latest iron from Pratt and Miller / Corvette Racing. Not a perfect race car but unobtainium to the public.”

AWA, meanwhile, posted on social media that while Mantella was out, the No. 13 Corvette would be continuing and present at the next round, the Acura Grand Prix of Long Beach.

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AWA receives first customer Corvette Z06 GT3.Rs

AWA has taken delivery of the two Corvette Z06 GT3.Rs with which it will contest the GTD class in the 2024 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship. The delivery marks a major milestone for GM and Corvette, the delivery of the first customer cars in …

“Delivering the first two customer Z06 GT3.Rs to AWA marks the start of the next phase of our Corvette customer support program,” said Christie Bagne, Corvette Z06 GT3.R Program Manager. “A big thank you to our constructor Pratt Miller, our GM Performance and Racing team and everyone at the GM Assembly Plant in Bowling Green. We look forward to the continued collaboration with AWA ahead of their preseason test program and on toward the Rolex 24.”

Canadian team AWA was announced earlier this year as the first customer Corvette program in IMSA GTD. Orey Fidani and Matt Bell will be the full-season drivers in the No. 13, while Anthony Mantella and Nico Varrone will pilot the No. 17. Lars Kern and Thomas Merrill will be the endurance additions, respectively.

“Receiving our two Corvette Z06 GT3.R was a special moment,” said Andrew Wojteczko, AWA team owner. “We are excited and motivated for this next chapter, and I’d like to extend my gratitude to Team Chevy for welcoming us with open arms. We can’t wait to get out on track.”

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The delivery is the first of three leading up to the debut of the Corvette GT3 on racetracks around the world. TF Sport will receive its Z06 GT3.Rs in January ahead of the FIA World Endurance Championship season, followed by DXDT Racing for GT World Challenge America. Two Z06 GT3.Rs will be campaigned by Corvette Racing by Pratt Miller Motorsports in GTD PRO in the WeatherTech Championship.

AWA is expected to be at IMSA’s pre-season test at Daytona International Speedway in two weeks. The season gets underway with the Roar Before the 24 on Jan. 19-21 ahead of the Rolex 24 At Daytona on Jan. 25-28.

AWA confirms drivers for GTD Corvette program

AWA’s lineup as it switches from LMP3 to GTD with the new Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R in the 2024 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship will look quite familiar, as much of the driver lineup remains unchanged. Orey Fidani and Matt Bell return as co-drivers, and Anthony Mantella will partner with Nico Varrone, who joined Mantella for the endurance races this past season when not driving with Ben Keating and Nicky Catsburg on their way to winning the WEC GTE-Am championship for Corvette Racing.

The Ontario, Canada-based outfit led by Andrew Wojteczko has been a fixture in IMSA competition for several years, most recently in the WeatherTech Championship’s LMP3 class, where Mantella, Varrone, Wayne Boyd and Thomas Merrill won the Rolex 24 At Daytona and the team’s two cars finished third and fourth in the championship. The team announced earlier this year that it would make the switch to GTD and Corvette, the first customer team for the Z06 GT3.R in the GTD class.

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Fidani has been with AWA since 2019 and has seen much success with the team. He will once again be accompanied by UK driver Bell, as the pairing reunite for a third consecutive season as teammates. Bell is a seasoned driver with experience in endurance championships around the world.

“Stepping up into the GTD class is both a very exciting and intense feeling,” said Fidani. “The competition at this level is world class, and features some of the best racing drivers in motorsports. All eyes will be on us, and I have full confidence in this team and this program. I’m thrilled to be working with Andrew Wojteczko and Matt Bell again. We’ve proven that this program has what it takes to fight for wins and I can’t wait to enter this next chapter with Corvette.”

“I’m really happy to be returning to AWA,” said Bell. “It’s been a fantastic experience to grow with this team and I can’t wait to return with them for 2024. To be competing with a Corvette is a dream come true, as I’ve loved these cars since I first began competing in IMSA in 2014. Chevrolet is an iconic motorsport manufacturer so to represent that name in the GTD ranks is a great opportunity for us all.”

Mantella will also be continuing his long-standing relationship with the team following a successful 2023 season that included a win at Indianapolis Motor Speedway in addition to the Rolex victory.

“It’s an honor to be driving a Corvette, this is a unique and rare opportunity that I feel very privileged to be a part of,” he said. “Corvette’s worldwide customer program is a trusted network, and it was a very easy decision to make after having worked with Chevrolet in the past. The advanced engineering and high level of professionalism that they bring to the racing scene is unprecedented. I want to express my gratitude to Andrew Wojteczko and everyone at Chevy Motorsports and Corvette for this one of a kind opportunity.”

For Argentinian Varrone, it marks a continuation with not only AWA, but Corvette. Part of the trio that won the FIA World Endurance Championship GTE-Am title for Corvette Racing, their trio of race victories so far included the 24 Hours of Le Mans.

“I’m very excited to be announced as a full season driver for AWA,” said Varrone. “It’s been a great first season together with some highlights including winning the Rolex 24 At Daytona, and I can’t wait to get my first laps under my belt in the Corvette Z06 GT3.R. I’m looking forward to this next season and I can’t wait to race for victories with Anthony Mantella. We’ve built an awesome friendship and both of us have the same desire to win. We have a busy year ahead of ourselves with new challenges but we like it that way!”

AWA will make their GTD debut with the Corvette Z06 GT3.R at the 2024 edition of the Rolex 24 next January.

IMSA teams preparing for new and upscaled programs in 2024

As the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship season heads toward its conclusion, several teams are hard at work preparing for new or expanded programs in 2024. That includes Wayne Taylor Racing with Andretti Autosport, which expands to a two-Acura …

“We’re on time, maybe a bit ahead of time in terms of getting people,” said Wayne Taylor. “We’re pretty confident that we’ll have all the right pieces in place. We put out a fairly aggressive ad on social media for people and we’ve been inundated. We’re short two or three people now, which is pretty damn good. But we’ve also got other teams in our organization we can call on for people, so we’re in good shape.”

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AWA Racing is moving from LMP3 to GTD with a pair of Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.Rs. Team principal Andrew Wojteczko reports that he expects a driver announcement to come just before Petit Le Mans. Meanwhile they’ve been delving into the Z06 GT3.R program wherever they can.

“We were able to participate with the test at Road America,” said Wojteczko. “It was great to have a bunch of my staff on hand. That was our first opportunity to see the car in action, which was great, we learned a lot, and it started to prepare ourselves on the equipment side and what we’re going to need to support the cars. We’re two months out now to our first test with our cars at at Sebring.”

Wojteczko says that scaling up to the GTD program won’t involve much change in the way of procedures and equipment; the bigger change will be more races — 10 weekends instead of six or seven — plus a new track for the team, Long Beach.

“I think from an operational standpoint, as a team, there’s more similarities than dissimilarities. So you know, we adapt our equipment and get rehearsed on the car, but I don’t see any any fundamental changes in approach. Some detail stuff like driver changing and stuff like that — with the prototype, we use a driver changer and in GTD, it’s still to be decided if that’s something we’re going to use or not. But the majority of our processes will remain and just move on.”

In the LMP2 category, which is set to grow for 2024 as some LMP3 entrants move up and new teams come in, some teams are reporting progress, and others are finding some challenges. United Autosports, which will run two cars in the class, including one for Ben Keating and Alex Quinn, has found its new home in JR III’s shop in North Carolina, as well as its general manager in Billy Glavin. Sean Creech Motorsport is moving from LMP3 with the unique choice of the Ligier JS P217. The team, however, is waiting for a lot of parts and spares to arrive at the shop before it can get to work. They do expect to meet their testing schedule, though.

Corvette making leap of faith in GTD with AWA

As GM’s plans for the Corvette Z06 GT3.R developed, the clear plan was for two cars in GTD PRO and two in GTD. The GTD PRO program will be handled by Pratt Miller; for its first customer Corvette racing program, though, the nod went to a team without any previous experience in GTD, and only a short history in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, AWA Racing. The team’s history and trajectory, which includes a 2023 Rolex 24 At Daytona victory in LMP3, indicated that it’s on the right path for success, according to Christie Bagne, Corvette Z06 GT3.R program manager.

“AWA comes in with a clear stated objective of growing and moving up through process,” Bagne said. “We’ve seen that happen already; they were successful in GT4, and then stepped into the WeatherTech Championship in LMP3. We’ve seen this team grow in terms of their results, we saw them very successful at Rolex this year, we’ve seen them with good consistency through the championship. We’ve seen the way they do brand representation and the way that they represent brands on social media. All of that has been growing — they’ve been showing they have the capability to be running in this class. They have a clear objective to grow and a clear plan to do that. So all of that was really appealing.”

At the same time that GM is taking a leap with AWA, AWA is taking a leap into a new category with the first GT3 Corvette that GM has produced, and the first GT3 car since the Cadillac ATS-V GT3 that raced as a factory program in World Challenge. Granted, Corvette Racing has a pretty fine record over the last 25 years, a fact not lost on AWA principal Andrew Wojteczko.

“I’d say it’s their long-time understanding of what’s required to build a reliable and competitive car,” Wojteczko said of what drove his decision. “Their focus is on being competitive and winning; I think that’s a great attitude, and something we want to be a part of.”

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AWA competed in IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge with a variety of manufacturers before moving to LMP3, tasting success along the way. But transitioning into GTD, Wojteczko recognizes that GM is putting a lot of faith in him to run a good program in what it considers its most important championship.

“It’s a huge milestone for myself for the team. And I’m just extremely grateful that the steps that we’ve taken caught the attention of Corvette, and they feel like we’re a worthy team to fulfill that role,” he said. “So, yeah, that’s a huge achievement. I’m very, very grateful for the opportunity.”

AWA ran a single Duqueine D08 in 2022, adding a second one at Petit Le Mans last year and running two cars this season. The No. 17 with Anthony Mantella and Wayne Boyd is currently second in the LMP3 points; the No. 13 duo of Orey Fidani and Matthew Bell is fourth. The No. 17 won the non-points Rolex 24 At Daytona with Mantella, Boyd, Nico Varrone and Thomas Merrill. And while Varrone is also part of Corvette Racing’s WEC program — along with Nicky Catsburg and Ben Keating — that has already clinched the WEC GTE-Am title and also won the class at Le Mans, that connection didn’t really play a part in getting the deal done. Instead, it was the quality of the team’s work.

“They take a really organized approach to it,” explained Bagne. “I was impressed by that. They come in and they have they have an org chart defined and they are looking at manageable milestones to be successful. So I would say the the vision that team has and the organization with which they approach executing that vision was really impressive and gave me confidence that they’ll be successful.”

The collaboration begins immediately. Bagne says Pratt Miller is testing the Z06 GT3.R at Road America this week after the race, and Wojteczko and AWA personnel will be on hand to observe as they embark on their two-car GTD program. The Corvette Z06 GT3.R has already undergone homologation testing in Europe, and the homologation is likely to be completed in October. AWA expects that its cars will be delivered in November.

AWA joins Corvette customer IMSA GTD ranks

The front-running AWA LMP3 team will turn its attention to the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship’s GT Daytona class in 2024 and field a pair of brand-new Corvette Z06 GT3.Rs. The Canadian outfit, class winners at January’s Rolex 24 At Daytona, …

The front-running AWA LMP3 team will turn its attention to the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship’s GT Daytona class in 2024 and field a pair of brand-new Corvette Z06 GT3.Rs.

The Canadian outfit, class winners at January’s Rolex 24 At Daytona, will receive technical support as part of the program with the cars built by Michigan’s Pratt Miller Motorsports. Complementing the factory Corvette Racing Z06 GT3.R effort that will run in the GTD PRO category, AWA’s upcoming presence in GTD is an important one for the brand as it embraces the GT3 formula and widespread customer racing engagements.

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“We are happy to welcome AWA to the Corvette Racing family,” said Christie Bagne, Corvette Z06 GT3.R Program Manager. “It was important for us to select a highly competitive and collaborative team to be our first representative in the WeatherTech Championship’s GTD class. AWA is a fantastic choice. The team has a proven capability of winning races in multiple sports car categories and series. Our goal is to help AWA compete for championships and race wins with the Z06 GT3.R in 2024 and beyond.”

AWA team owner Andrew Wojteczko echoed Bagne’s sentiments.

“I am honored to have the opportunity for AWA to represent Corvette in the IMSA WeatherTech Championship,” he said. “I have the utmost respect for the people involved and am looking forward to doing our part to help secure results for the Z06 GT3.R.”