CN and GT Class Battles in the 2022 Russian Endurance Challenge at Moscow Raceway

The equipment in the series is highly advanced, and the track conditions matched the challenge: Sunday’s heat proved a stern test for the opening leg of the 2022 Russian Endurance Challenge. Forty-three competitors gathered near Moscow at the Moscow Raceway, with four women among the starters.

Competitors were organized into 20 crews across four classes: CN Sport Prototype, CN 1.6 Sport Prototype, GT Pro, and GT.

BR03 prototypes on the Moscow racetrack

The BR Engineering squad, featuring Vitaly Petrov and Mikhail Aleshin, and Viktor Shaitar alongside Sergey Sirotkin, competed on the new BR03 prototypes. They engaged in a lively duel early on with the Blackthorn crew in a Ligier, driven by Igor Mukhin and Egor Efrosinin. Both outfits shared the CN class podium in the end, underscoring a tight battle across the early laps.

CN class

1. BR Engineering 17 (No 17, Viktor Shaitar, Sergey Sirotkin) – 133 laps
2. BR Engineering 11 (No. 11, Mikhail Aleshin, Vitaly Petrov) – 133 laps
3. Blackthorn (No. 28, Igor Mukhin, Egor Efrosinin) – 132 laps

Marussia GT

Early in the second hour, a safety car deployment occurred after a faulty fixed wheel detached at high speed on the IY Engineering team’s Marussia GT prototype driven by Vitaly Larionov. The reset involved a 40-minute pit stop, yet the car recovered and ultimately reached the podium.

GT Pro Class

1. Capital Racing Team (No. 13, Denis Remenyako) – 136 laps
2. Yadro Motorsport (No. 4, Sergey Stolyarov) – 133 laps
3. IY Engineering (No. 7, Vitaly Larionov) – 83 laps

Yadro Motorsport and Capital Racing Team led the overall standings, aided by the reliability and efficient pit work of the BR03 entries. Strategic refueling, timely driver swaps, and careful pacing ultimately influenced the results, with Stolyarov incurring four penalty laps during a pit lane sequence and dropping to third.

Absolute ranking

1. Capital Racing Team (Denis Remenyako) – 136 laps
2. BR Engineering 17 (No 17, Viktor Shaitar, Sergey Sirotkin) – 133 laps
3. Yadro Motorsport (No. 4, Sergey Stolyarov) – 133 laps

Overall winner

The GT class finale unfolded in the closing laps. An unfortunate puncture knocked Marat Khairov and Gabriele Pian from second place; while their BMW was being serviced in the pits, a rival BMW crew led by Oleg Semenov and Egor Orudzhev surged ahead, finishing just over thirty seconds clear at the line.

GT class

1. Motor Sharks (No. 83, Anton Nemkin, Ivan Lukashevich) – 130 laps
2. Time4bmw (No 98, Oleg Semenov, Egor Orudzhev) – 128 laps
3. APRTeam (No. 26, Marat Khairov, Gabriele Piana) – 128 laps

The CN 1.6 class stands on the basis of Shortcut cars, with two entries featuring female drivers: Tatyana Dobrynina in crew No. 44 racing under the banner Races and Tochka, and Olga Zinchenko from DK YMT Your Marketing Team in Shortcut No. 1. The main confrontation in this class pitted crew No. 88 from AZDRIVE SOUND C against the No. 44 entry. Qualification favored the AZDRIVE crew, but race dynamics granted the Races and Tochka team the victory through smart strategy and timing.

Tatiana Dobrynina

Class CN 1.6

1. Races and Tochka (No. 44, Vadim Vereshchagin, Tatiana Dobrynina, Dmitry Solovov, Ivan Pugachev) – 103 laps
2. AZDRIVE SOUND C (No. 88, Artem Viktorov, Alexander Butslov, Kirill Zakharov) – 101 laps
3. DK YMT (No. 1, Olga Zinchenko, Stanislav Burmistrov, Alexander Galakhov) – 93 laps

In the Grand Moscow stage, the local championship also featured long-distance races. The victory in this standings went to the No. 17 BR03 crew of Viktor Shaitar and Sergey Sirotkin, followed by the No. 11 BR03 crew of Mikhail Aleshin and Vitaly Petrov, with the Ligier No. 28 driven by Igor Mukhin and Yegor Efrosinin taking third place. These results reflected the strength of the Russian endurance program and its cross-class depth.

• The REC series calendar for the 2022 season includes four stages with additional events scheduled in St. Petersburg, Kazan, and Sochi.