The 2014 Blancpain Endurance Series kicked off Sunday at Monza, with the Team M-Sport Bentley cars finishing back-to-back in the 7th and 8 th places. Now, in a press conference in New York, Bentley has announced that the Continental GT3 will make its North American competition debut
in the Pirelli World Challenge GT with Dyson Racing.
"[PWC] is racing terrific venues, in great locations, and competing against great other cars. This isn't jalopy racing. This isn't Saturday night stuff,"
CEO Rob Dyson told us in an exclusive interview. "These are real, prestigious automobiles … we're going to be racing against the best the world has to
offer. We've always done that. Now we're doing it with Bentley."
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"IMSA long ago abandoned it, but for a long time the sprint race was a staple," Dyson's son and team driver Chris Dyson added. "It's us, in a lot of ways,
getting back to our roots … Bentley, too."
Butch Leitzinger, who drove the Bentley EXP-8 at Le Mans 2001 and 2002, will spearhead a two-car GT sprint program. He'll man the Dyson Continental GT3
during its first US motorsport appearance, set for the PWC's 8th and 9th round double-header June 19-21 at Road America. The second
car will be added later this season.
After taking part in the latter half of 2014's PWC races, Dyson plans on running the Continental GT3 for the entire 2015 schedule. The firm says it thinks
its greatest strength will be reliability.
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"Reliability is number one, but it's speed, too," the older Dyson explains. "Car is quick. Power is good. We'll see. Obviously in the Pirelli World
Challenge, the races are shorter. This is a punch-out. This is flat-out sprint racing—when the flag drops, everybody's gone. We believe the ingredients are
there to be successful."
A spokesperson from Crewe told us that this tie-up has been in discussion since the GT3 concept was launched, but that familiarity with Dyson from the
earlier Le Mans projects helped seal the deal. Bentley's Director of Motorsport, Brian Gush, thinks that will give the team another advantage.
"You've got Butch and Guy [Smith], who drove for us 10 years ago [at Le Mans], wanting to come back—I'm pretty proud of that. They're second-generation
Bentley Boys," says Gush.
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Smith, who was Dyson's man behind the wheel for Bentley's win at Le Mans in 2003, currently drives the Continental GT3 in Blancpain and will be available
to drive PWC "as his European commitments permit."
The race-spec Continental came to fruition from clean sheet in just 36 weeks, and now Bentley hopes Dyson can help hone the car's potential and raise its
North American profile. The companies see one another as a "natural fit" and believe there's a mutual benefit in sharing development and technology.
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