Kyalami 9 Hours rescheduled to February

We will have to wait two more months to discover who will be the champions of the Intercontinental GT Challenge in 2021, as its season finale, the Joburg Kyalami 9 Hours, was moved to early February, as per statement issued by SRO and the local promoter in South Africa.

Initially, the race would take place in 4 December, but with the new Omicron variant of the Coronavirus spreading through the southern Africa and even affecting other parts of the World, like central Europe, travel restrictions were imposed by the South African government, which would make the entry of many of the international teams difficult or even impossible, so SRO took the decision of initially postpone the race until they could find a new date to end the 2021 schedule.

A point that enters in the discussion is that the 2021 finale was too close of the start of the 2022, as the return of an already rescheduled Bathurst 12 Hour is set for 27 February, which would leave only these three weeks to move everything over the Indian Ocean to enter Australia, considering that Australian government doesn’t impose travel restrictions too, which could lead to the race being cancelled for the second year in a row.

According to SRO, the date was established after talks with teams and manufacturers involved in the competition, and all parties agreed that the three weeks at disposal would be enough time to move to the local of the new season.

With the new date in place, it’s possible that the new cars that debuted at the FANATEC GT World Challenge Europe finale at Barcelona, the BMW M4 GT3 and the Audi R8 LMS Evo II GT3, would be allowed to participate competing for GT3 honors instead of the Invitational class, as both would be already homologated and with the balance of performance in place.

PHOTO: SRO/Dirk Bogaerts