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Mortara to make Audi return in Spa 24 Hours

Edoardo Mortara will make his first appearance in an Audi in four years in next month's Spa 24 Hours, as he joins the WRT team's four-car line-up for the Belgian classic.

Edoardo Mortara Venturi

Edoardo Mortara Venturi

Sam Bloxham / Motorsport Images

The Venturi Formula E driver was named alongside Charles Weerts and Frank Stippler in WRT's #31 Audi R8 LMS for the centrepiece round of the GT World Challenge Europe season.

It will mark the 33-year-old's first outing in an Audi since the 2016 FIA GT World Cup at Macau, which he also contested for WRT. His only previous appearance at Spa in an Audi also came that year, when he finished ninth for ISR.

Mortara was part of Audi's DTM stable from 2011-16 before defecting to Mercedes for 2017, and was a regular in the Ingolstadt marque's GT3 machinery in that time.

He then became part of Mercedes' roster of GT3 drivers, appearing in blue riband events at Spa, the Nurburgring and Macau, where he won the GT race for a fourth time in 2017.

Spa will however be Mortara's first GT3 race of the 2020 season.

Two of WRT's four Spa entries will be crewed exclusively by factory Audi drivers. Robin Frijns, Christopher Mies and Dries Vanthoor team up in the Belgian squad's #30 car, while the #31 entry will be shared by Rene Rast, Mirko Bortolotti and Kelvin van der Linde.

Audi is offering works support to two other teams at Spa, with regular GTWCE Europe team Attempto getting factory backing for the first time.

Mattia Drudi, Patric Niederhauser and Frederic Vervisch will drive for Attempto, while Christopher Haase, Nico Muller and Markus Winkelhock join Team Sainteloc.

Audi is searching for a first Spa 24 Hours win since 2017, when Haase, Winkelhock and Jules Gounon took honours in a Sainteloc-run R8 LMS.

#25 Audi Sport Team Sainteloc Racing Audi R8 LMS: Markus Winkelhock, Christopher Haase, Jules Gounon

#25 Audi Sport Team Sainteloc Racing Audi R8 LMS: Markus Winkelhock, Christopher Haase, Jules Gounon

Photo by: Alessio Morgese / Luca Rossini / Stefano Arcari

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