Jules Gounon promoted to official Mercedes driver in GT

This is called bouncing. Official Bentley driver for several years, Jules Gounon found himself without a contract when the English firm decided to abandon its GT3 program at the end of 2020. Of course, we saw him driving at Le Mans last year and at the 24 Hours of Daytona last weekend with the Ferrari of Risi Competitizione, but it could only be freelance.

Fortunately, the Ardéchois told us at the end of 2020 that he had found the right fit with another manufacturer, it remained to be seen which one. It will ultimately be Mercedes. A manufacturer he already knows, since the 26-year-old driver had competed in a Blancpain GT Series season in 2017, in the AKKA-ASP team.

Gounon is among the eight factory drivers of the star brand alongside Maximilian Buhk, Maro Engel, Maximilian Götz, Thomas Jäger, Raffaele Marciello, Luca Stolz and Daniel Juncadella.

The latter arrives in particular to bring his experience in simracing, which Mercedes wants to develop. Alongside him, Adam Christodoulou, Raffaele Marciello and Canadian simracer Daniel Morad will represent the manufacturer online.

On the track, Mercedes-AMG announced that it would be present in DTM this season with several client teams. As in previous years, the Mercedes-AMG Customer Racing program includes the 24-hour races at the Nürburgring and Spa, as well as rounds of the GT World Challenge Europe, the Intercontinental GT Challenge and of course the ADAC GT Masters.

“The objective is to win championship titles on all continents and to race in the lead in the highlights of the 24 hours in particular, as we have already been able to prove in particular at Daytona”, comments Stefan Wendl, the boss of Mercedes- AMG Customer Racing.