Mercedes-AMG in IMSA Sportscar Championship

Long live the 6.2 V8! And flaming liveries...

Sportscar racing, as you may well have noticed, is experiencing something of a resurgence at the moment. There's a Bentley factory campaign, a big, bad BMW and a Lamborghini team amongst many more brilliant cars, competing on great circuits across the globe. And now we have one more.

Germany about to show the US what a V8 is

There has been Mercedes representation in American sportscars previously, the old SLS previously entered into the Pirelli World Challenge (as the IMSA series used to be known). Now though an official Mercedes-Benz USA and AMG team will compete in the 2017 IMSA series with that wicked AMG GT3. It has been doing rather well everywhere else, after all. The M156 V8 will live on for a little longer!

Mercedes will work with Riley Motorsports, one car running as "AMG-Team Riley Motorsports" and the other as WeatherTech Racing. A third GT3 will race with AMG's Customer Sports team SunEnergy1 Racing. The cars will compete in the GT Daytona (GTD) class, where everything is built to international GT3 spec. Already in the IMSA series the GTD class features a Huracan, R8, V8 Vantage and Dodge Viper - tough competition!

Tobias Moers said of AMG's decision: "The high demand for the Mercedes-AMG GT3, particularly after the legendary 1-2-3-4 finish at this year's 24-hour race at the Nurburgring, has inspired us to establish a Customer Sports Program in the US." Should you be one of those in demand, the AMG Customer Sports site will make for rather interesting reading. And if you're just a fan, the 12-round championship kicks off at Daytona in January. Who's up for PH does Petit Le Mans?

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moorejam

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