MARC Cars Australia will expand into the Australian GT Championship this year following the acquisition of a brand new BMW M6 GT3.
The Queensland-based operation is set to field the M6 GT3 in the four-round Australian Endurance Championship and selected Australian GT sprint series events.
Run under the banner of MARC GT, the M6 GT3 will be piloted by Morgan Haber and Jake Camilleri, who have both progressed through the MARC ranks, having raced the organisation’s self-built V8 sedan racers.
The M6 GT3 is the second to join the Australian GT grid following in the footsteps of the factory supported Steven Richards Motorsport entry.
MARC GT’s M6 GT3 will be run independently from the SRM BMW Australia outfit.
The team plans to debut the car in the Australian GT event at Phillip Island from May 27-29.
MARC GT boss Ryan McLeod says moving into GT3 racing was the logical next step for his business, confirming the car will be run alongside his MARC Cars Australia V8 sedan program.
“Moving to Australian GT is the next step of the MARC Cars business,” McLeod told Speedcafe.com.
“In the beginning the MARC Car was created to compete internationally in races with the GT cars
“The ultimate goal is to compete internationally with GT3 cars. We started with an Astra, moved to the MARC Car and now the GT3.
“It is great that we have Morgan (Haber) and Jake (Camilleri) who were with us with the Astra and they have now progressed right through into GT3 cars with us.
“The release of the new car dovetails nicely with what we want to do.
“The MARC Cars program is still active and operating and expanding but the GT3 will allow us to compete for outright wins instead of battling for class wins, which is what we want to do.
“We want the next wave of drivers coming along to use us to not only race nationally but internationally.”
Drivers Haber and Camilleri are eagerly awaiting their first opportunity behind the wheel of the M6 GT3.
“To be one of the foundation drivers for MARC GT in a brand new BMW M6 is simply awesome,” said Haber.
“I really enjoy racing with this team, I can’t think of a better way to return to the GT series.
“This really is a dream come true for me,” added Camilleri.
“It only seems like yesterday we were embarking on our first trip to Dubai with Ryan and the Astras.
“Now we’ve done so much together, and to have such a weapon of a car to launch into GT3 racing is just mind blowing. I can’t wait to get started.”
McLeod has also confirmed plans to field the car in next year’s Bathurst 12 Hour from February 3-5.
“We have been staunch supporter of that event since the very beginning so the immediate thing is to put together an effort to compete to win the race outright,” added McLeod.
A shakedown of its M6 GT3 is scheduled at Queensland Raceway on Thursday and Friday this week prior to its debut at Phillip Island.
BMW factory driver Alexander Sims is set to head out to help the team prepare the car for Phillip Island along with an engineer from the Munich manufacturer.
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