There’s an important first this weekend for Alex Fontana. The Swiss driver will be driving the Kessel Racing Ferrari 296GT3 in the Monza round of the GT World Challenge Endurance series. The Ticino-based driver, already a two-time Endurance series champion and winner of last year’s Pro-Am title, is returning to the series promoted by SRO on the occasion of the Monza race. This will in fact mark his debut at the wheel of a Ferrari entered by the Kessel Racing team, a Lugano-based pairing that sees the Prancing Horse’s team of reference in Switzerland line up with the most successful local driver in recent history, for what promises to be a fascinating weekend.
Alex will be driving the Prancing Horse’s latest model alongside his well-established partner “Hash”, with whom he competes in the GT Open series. The pair will be joined by Ben Tuck, a 27-year-old English driver. For Fontana, already a protagonist and winner in the Silver Cup and Pro-Am categories, this will be his debut in Bronze Cup as well as his first contact with Ferrari in the world of GT racing. After competing with McLaren, Jaguar, Mercedes, Audi, Porsche and Lamborghini, this weekend will mark his historic debut with the marque from Maranello.
The Monza weekend is the eighth round of the GT World Challenge Europe and the fourth round in the Endurance series with the race on Sunday 22nd September starting at 15:30 and finishing at 18:30. The starting grid will instead be defined on the Sunday morning, from 9:00 am, when the GT3 cars will be able to exploit for their full potential for the first time on a track recently renovated to host the Formula 1 Grand Prix.
Alex Fontana
“I am delighted to be able to link my name to that of Kessel Racing for the Monza race. I knew the Kessel family even before I started racing because here in Ticino they are a real institution assiociated with to the Ferrari brand. I am also thrilled to have this chance because as a driver it will be a new challenge at the wheel of the Ferrari 296 GT3, alongside Hash, who has progressed so much with me in recent years, and Ben Tuck. The Brianza track is something of a home race for us given its proximity to Lugano and I hope I can immediately find the right confidence with the car, but above all to have fun in what is certainly a championship of the highest level.”