Impressive Frank Bird Gains Gulf 12 Hours Prize Drive

The AMG Young Driver Test took place last week at the Circuit Ricardo Tormo near Valencia which was attended by 22 talented youngsters, all of whom hold a Gold or Silver FIA classification.

The participants, who come from all over the world, were coached on site by a team of Mercedes-AMG Performance drivers, each of whom was assigned to a different group. To ensure optimum comparability, the various Mercedes-AMG GT3 cars were matched for weight and fitted with identical Pirelli tyres. 

The Haupt Racing Team (HRT) nominee, 24-year-old British driver Frank Bird from Penrith in Cumbria and 21-year-old Italian Lorenzo Ferrari, who drove a Windward Racing AMG GT3, came out on top against strong competition. 

As a result, both Bird and Ferrari will now share a cockpit in the Gulf 12 Hours which forms the season finale of the Intercontinental GT Challenge powered by Pirelli. The race takes place at the YAS Marina Circuit in Abu Dhabi on 8/10 December. 

The car will be entered by the GruppeM Mercedes-AMG Customer Racing team, and their professional co-driver will be Austrian Lucas Auer who was a member of the coaching team in Valencia.
 
One of the drivers Frank will be competing against is nine-times MotoGP champion Valentino Rossi, who will make a debut appearance in the Middle East’s premier GT endurance race, driving a BMW.
 
Frank Bird: "I am very happy with the result of the Young Driver Test. It's an honour to have been given this opportunity by HRT and I felt very comfortable with the team. We worked hard, focused on ourselves and ultimately put in a great performance. Many thanks to the whole team and to Luca Stolz, who helped me a lot as my driver coach. I'm looking forward to competing in a Mercedes-AMG GT3 at the Gulf 12 Hours. In Lorenzo Ferrari and Lucas Auer, we have a good line-up and we hope to bring home the best possible result."
 
Lucas Auer, Mercedes-AMG Performance driver: "The AMG Young Driver Test in Valencia was a great event and the quality of the participants was extremely high. Lorenzo Ferrari and Frank Bird did a really excellent job. Now I'm really looking forward to competing with the two of them in Abu Dhabi, and I hope that we acquit ourselves well as a team." 


Image: Frank Bird beat 20 other young drivers to land the Gulf 12 Hours prize drive for Mercedes.