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Rush for entries to Dunlop 24 Hours of Dubai

Motorsport fans are in line for another round close battles and thrills whn the Dunlop 24 Hours of Dubai, January from 10-12th, 2013 take place.

No less than 50 teams have already signed up to compete in the eighth running of the event.

Once again, this shows the steadily increasing popularity and status of the Dunlop 24 Hours of Dubai as the first international endurance race of the new year for GTs, touring cars and 24 Hours of Specials, a media release said.

Speaking on behalf of Dutch agency Creventic, founders and, together with DNRT, organisers of the Dunlop 24 Hours of Dubai, Gerrie Willems says: “Having such a big and international entry this early in the year already is really great.”

A special entry fee including transportation of 5,000 Euros for touring cars with engines up to 2600 cc was also received with enthusiasm by teams as several touring car teams have already signed up. “This allows us to keep a good mix of GTs and touring cars”, says Willems.

Class structures maintained with slight improvements

For the 2013 Dunlop 24 Hours of Dubai, and also for this year’s 24 Hours of Barcelona (September 7^th-9^th), the clear and proven class structures have been maintained. However, following feedback from competitors, slight improvements have been made. For instance, all Porsche 997 Cup cars built from 2007 till 2011 are now eligible to run in the Porsche Cup category, with the factory-standard 90 litres fuel tank required for the 2010 and 2011 models.

Further improvements have been made to the tank/weight balance for cars with turbocharged engines of up to 2600 cc, which can also benefit from the reduced entry fee of 5,000 Euros. This enhances the chances for cars like SEAT Leon, Audi TT etc. A similar change has been made for the SP3-GT4A class, which attracted 19 cars in this year’s race.

GT3 field even better balanced, while professionals can eat their hearts out

Crevetic’s unique balance of performance system with reference lap times, introduced in Dubai a few years ago, has helped to reduced the gap between amateur and (semi-)professional drivers and teams.

However, some of the professionals also had their problems with the minimum reference times. Gerrie Willems says: “While the amateurs and gentlemen drivers liked our format, criticism from some of the professionals was quite logical, as any racing driver wants to go as fast as he or she can.

Therefore, we have decided to modify our system and skip the reference time for teams and drivers who want this and replace it with a weight increase and a somewhat smaller fuel tank.

Like this, our basic goal of improving the competition and reducing the gap between amateurs and pros is still being achieved.”

In 2012, the Dunlop 24 Hours of Dubai got more than 4,000 hours of television coverage worldwide. “This was a significant increase compared to previous years. For next year, we plan to have live coverage again, with highlights being shown after the event on a much larger scale

Moreover, it looks like we will have the enthusiastic people from Radio Le Mans on board again, too”, says Gerrie Willems.

Emirati driver Khalid Al Qubaisi led the Abu Dhabi Black Falcon Mercedes SLS AMG GT3 to his greatest victory when he crossed the line to win the 2012 edition of the race in January and once again a big contingent of Emirati drivers and UAE based drivers and teams are expected to compete in the 2013 race - plans are currently being formulated and finalised.

sports@khaleejtimes.com