After the participation at the race in Mugello back in 2016, Alessandro Zanardi, official driver and BMW brand ambassador, will get again on track on the Tuscan track for the closing round of the Italian GT Endurance Championship.
He will be behind the wheel of the BMW M6 GT3 fielded by BMW Team Italia and will share the car with co-equipers Stefano Comandini and Erik Johansson, that are currently lead the standings and challenging Lamborghini and Ferrari for the Italian title.
The news has been made official today by BMW Italia and it excited the enthusiasm of thousands of fans that cheered him in the closing round of the 2016 campaign. Back then at Mugello, Zanardi won race-2 leading Ferrari and Audi in front of an amazing crowd. The 52 years old Champion from Bologna has been practising Paracycling since 2012 and he obtained 16 gold medals in World Championships and Paralympic Games.
“I cannot wait to get on track in Mugello for several reasons – Zanardi stated – first of all, a few months have passed since my last race in Daytona and I look forward to getting behind the wheel again. The BMW Team Italia is managed by my old friend Roberto Ravaglia and is a second family to me, as BMW M Motorsport engineers that have been next to me for several years. We now reunite on track. Finally, and not less importantly, I remember the victory of 2016 at the debut in the BMW M6 GT3. It has been an unforgettable weekend. Now I want to enjoy the preparation to the race in Mugello from the first to the last moment.”
The BMW M6 GT3 will be properly modified by BMW Motorsport engineers and the controls have been improved following the experience at the recent 24 Hours of Daytona that saw the Bolognese Champion behind the wheel.
Differently from 2016, in Mugello Zanardi will compete without the prosthesis as this turned out the best situation and he has been breaking with the manual system. The standard pedals will be kept on the M6 GT3 so that it could be used by Comandini and Johansson, while the steering wheel will be switched at the driver change. The changes made will be further adapted to the layout of the Mugello racetrack and will involve the fully automatic clutch tested in Misano during the DTM and in Daytona, which will allow Zanardi to have one less command to work with.
Before the race, Zanardi will focus on one of his other passions: the triathlon. This coming weekend the Bolognese champion will be in Cervia for the Ironman Italy, the event where he set the record time of 8h:26m.06s last year.
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