World of EuroNASCAR’s first Race Preview for American SpeedFest 9 looks at the Entry List changes that will happen on Brands Hatch as a new SpeedFest entry record is achieved with the 35 teams and 59 drivers that are entered in the current Entry List.
The NASCAR Whelen Euro Series will start the second round of the 2022 season this week as the series returns to Brands Hatch for the ninth edition of the popular American SpeedFest round.
American SpeedFest 9 is set to feature a record breaking Entry List as a total of 35 teams and 59 drivers are set to compete in both EuroNASCAR PRO and EuroNASCAR 2 this weekend, a sharp increase in number from the 26 cars and 41 drivers that took part in last year’s SpeedFest.
Just like with the season-opening Valencia NASCAR Fest at Circuit Ricardo Tormo last month, World of EuroNASCAR’s Race Preview for the SpeedFest will be divided into three parts as we will focus on the changes in the Entry List on the first part while EuroNASCAR PRO and EuroNASCAR 2 will receive their dedicated Race Previews in Part 2 and Part 3.
On the team changes side, the three series debuting teams MK1 Racing Italia, Buggyra ZM Racing and Racingfuel Motorsport are set to make their first appearance at the American SpeedFest as two individual teams that are entered for Valencia NASCAR Fest will not be entered this weekend.
The first of which is the Panasport team, who will not bring their military-plane liveried No. 4 Camaro to the UK this weekend and so far is not expected to enter any other rounds this year.
The second team to not make the trip to the UK is the No. 25 Not Only Motorsport team, who was present for Valencia but ultimately didn’t take any further part in the Valencia round following Paolo Maria Silvestrini’s withdrawal and Alina Loibnegger’s last-minute switch to Racingfuel Motorsport.
In addition, Buggyra ZM Racing has been listed to compete under the Buggyra ZM – MFT Racing banner this week, signaling a further increase in partnership between Buggyra and the French-Mauritian Motors Formula Team on their Equality & Diversity Program.
There are five driver changes that are scheduled to happen for the EuroNASCAR PRO class, which had 33 drivers listed to compete this weekend. The first of which is the addition of Norwegian driver Eivind Brynildsen, who is scheduled to make his debut in the top class with the No. 40 SpeedHouse Ford.
Yasmeen Koloc is also scheduled to make her debut in the top class this weekend as she is listed to do the double duty in Buggyra’s No. 38 Ford. Interestingly, Yasmeen’s name was not listed in the first Provisional Entry List that was revealed on 6 June as Gustas Grinbergas and Teo Calvet were initially listed to compete with the No. 38 Ford at Brands Hatch.
However, Grinbergas has confirmed to us during the making of our latest Questions article that he will not compete at Brands Hatch and subsequent Entry List updates would reveal that Yasmeen is indeed scheduled to do the double this weekend.
Racingfuel Motorsport would feature an all-new cast of drivers this weekend as Christoph Lenz and 24H Series veteran Constantin Klenzer has been listed to compete with the team’s No. 58 and No. 94 Camaro respectively.
For Lenz, it would give the Swiss driver his first appearance in the top class after he competed in EuroNASCAR 2 at Valencia following Lucas Luhr’s arrival to the team. For Klenzer, it would give the defending 24H TCE Series champion an opportunity to diversify his racing experience after a successful few years in the endurance TCR racing category.
The latest EuroNASCAR PRO shake-up in the Entry List happened just moments ago when Tobias Dauenhauer announced that he would be forced to sit out the SpeedFest after he was tested positive for COVID-19. We’re wishing Dauenhauer the best of luck on his recovery and we hope to see Dauenhauer back on the grid at Vallelunga next month.
EuroNASCAR 2, which currently has 32 drivers listed in the current Entry List, also had four driver changes that are due to happen this weekend.
The first of the changes involves Kasparas Vingilis, who is listed to compete in Academy Motorsport’s No. 1 Ford instead of the No. 2 FJ. Vingilis will act as a replacement for Andrea Tronconi, who will not make the trip to the UK this week.
Claudio Remigio Cappelli will be making his return to the EuroNASCAR 2 division after he was listed to compete in the No. 18 Race Art Technology Toyota. As a result, Cappelli is scheduled to do a rather interesting double as even though MK1 Racing Italia holds a technical alliance with Race Art Technology, Cappelli’s double duty attempt will see him compete with two different teams in the same race week – a rare occurrence in the series.
British driver Matthew Ellis will be acting as the UK’s sole representative in the grid after the Brit announced on 4 June that he will be making his EuroNASCAR debut with Racingfuel Motorsport at the SpeedFest.
The Entry List has listed him as the new EN2 driver of Racingfuel’s No. 58 Camaro, replacing Lenz who moved up to ENPRO as mentioned before. He will be joined by Alina Loibnegger who will be racing with the Austrian team once again.
The latest change in the EuroNASCAR 2 Entry List, first reported by ThreeWide yesterday, was the addition of Finnish driver Tuomas Pöntinen to Team Bleekemolen. Pöntinen, who is the defending Porsche Sprint Challenge NEZ champion, would replace Leevi Lintukanto in the No. 23 Ford after Lintukanto was not able to compete at the SpeedFest for reasons currently unknown as of the writing of this article.
Disclaimer: Unless noted on the photo, all photos used in this article are courtesy of NASCAR Whelen Euro Series / Stephane Azemard / Bart Dehaese.
Last Updated: 10 June 2022