Walking through the SRO America (formerly Pirelli World Challenge) paddock, one will see some of the world’s most exotic production-based sports cars. They are beautiful, sleek and expensive.

Familiar names such as Ferrari, Porsche, Bentley, Mercedes, Lamborghini, Audi, McLaren, Maserati, Camaro and Mustang are joined by lesser-known manufacturers such as Ginetta, KTM and SIN. Together they fill one of the most diverse paddocks in all of racing.

But the cars don’t always look as pretty after competing in the two flat-out Sprint and SprintX races per weekend.

One of the most successful aspects to the SRO America campaign is its use of class racing with so many different types of cars. SCCA amateur racing with numerous classes dates back to the 1940s, and annually those wild Runoffs events are some of the most entertaining motorsports competitions in the world.

On the professional road racing side, more than 30 years of highly competitive, wheel-to-wheel production-based action has highlighted the sprint-style class racing — from GT3 to GT4 to Touring Car categories.

Past driving champions in the then Pirelli World Challenge series included Johnny O’Connell, Peter Cunningham, Patrick Long, Randy Pobst, R.K. Smith, Elliott Forbes-Robinson, Lawson Aschenbach, Bobby and Tommy Archer and, most recently, Portugal’s Alvaro Parente and Finland’s Toni Vilander.

The Sprint-format (50 minutes, one driver, no pit stops) proved to be a popular structure for fans, drivers and crews. It produced flat-out racing from green flag to checkered flag, with superb competition from each of the racing divisions.

In 2018, worldwide entrepreneur Stephane Ratel, a successful sports car magnate in the GT3 category, became the majority shareholder of WC Vision (producers of the Pirelli World Challenge), the North American version of Ratel’s SRO Motorsports Group.

This year’s 13-round road racing series is known as SRO GT World Challenge America powered by AWS (Amazon Web Services) and it will feature GT3 cars.

In addition, the SRO America portion of the SRO Motorsports Group organizes the competitive Pirelli GT4 America series and the TC America tour for Touring Cars.

In 2020, GT World Challenge Powered by AWS is a new international championship produced by the SRO Motorsports Group worldwide. Twenty-two non-clashing events will see sprint and endurance rounds staged across Europe, North America and Asia.

These races will have leading manufacturers competing through their regional customer racing programs.

“Our company has produced great GT racing for many decades and the worldwide influence of Stephane and his outstanding company has been a highlight for the former Pirelli World Challenge, now SRO Motorsports Group America,” said Greg Gill, president and CEO of SRO America. “Working closely with the manufacturers and giving the customers a great format to compete has given the class racing a new boost for the coming year.

“We will be making a couple of significant changes in the 2020 season. In the GT3 classes, we have decided to go toward the customer racers with three classes this year, We have the Pro-Am (pairing Platinum/Gold- rated drivers and Bronze-rated drivers), the Silver (Silver-rated drivers) and the Am (Bronze-rated drivers) classes. Plus, the introduction of the GT Sports Club class for older GT3 cars and new GT2 cars with bronze drivers looks to be showing great growth already. We are excited for the 2020 season.”

SRO America is scheduled to kick off its season March 6-8 at Circuit of the Americas in Austin, Texas.

The GT World Challenge America powered by AWS will again campaign with GT3 production-based sports cars with the 90-minute SprintX race format (two drivers) in the Pro-Am, Silver and Am classes.

During a majority of the race weekends, GT3 contests will be doubleheaders with Saturday and Sunday events. In addition, the new GT Sport Club classification will have the all-new GT2 and retired (older) GT3 sports cars with bronze drivers.

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