There are big changes coming at Audi Sport for next year for the German manufacturer’s customer racing programme, according to a letter, seen by Dailysportscar and Endurance-Info, sent by Audi to its partner teams.
The Audi customer racing programme, encompassing GT2, GT3, GT4 and TCR, supplies somewhere in the region of 600 cars to its partner teams across the aforementioned ‘pillars’.
The letter was signed by Chris Reinke, head of customer racing at Audi Sport, and Rolf Michl, Audi Sport’s managing director. In it, the two confirm that sales of cars will end after Q1 2024, but all orders placed until then will be fulfilled — but that Audi’s ‘strategic operations’ will end from 2024 onwards, as well as the co-operation between Audi Sport and its customer teams, who were previously supported with factory drivers.
In addition, the homologation for all current customer racing models — in GT2, GT3, GT4 and TCR — will be extended for at least one further cycle, and teams will still receive customer advice from Audi Sport advisors, as well as a full spare parts service.
Finally, the letter stated Audi Sport is examining motorsport-related follow-up projects to replace the customer racing programme.
This shift in priorities from Audi comes as the Volkswagen Group-owned company is undergoing a radical shift, aiming to electrify its full range of road cars by 2030, in a project known as Vorsprung 2030. The company is also entering Formula 1 as a full factory team in 2026, having bought the long-running Sauber operation earlier this year.
It marks the end of an era in GT and touring car racing, with Audi’s GT3 customer programme going back to 2009 with the original R8 LMS. Now in its third iteration, the R8 LMS Evo II, it has won almost everything there is to win in the GT racing world, and has spawned two siblings, the GT2 and GT4 cars.
The end of the customer racing programme may affect teams which race in the DTM series, including Abt Sportsline, Engstler Motorsport, and Tresor Attempto Racing, all of whom may need to find a new manufacturer partner. Many of Audi’s factory-supported drivers have also left in the last year, including Robin Frijns, Kelvin van der Linde, Rene Rast, Dries Vanthoor, and Charles Weerts.
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