Marlon Stockinger to compete in 2016 Blancpain GT Series

Filipino-Swiss Marlon Stockinger will be in a different racing cockpit this season as he drives in the 2016 Blancpain GT Series with I.S.R. Racing. Stockinger will be driving an Audi R8 LMS for the I.S.R. auto-owned team who also runs the largest Volkwagen and Audi dealership network in Czech Republic.

Stockinger has revealed to AutoIndustriya.com that he will start his 2016 Blancpain GT Series campaign at the Misano World Circuit in Italy this weekend (April 8-10) driving in the Sprint Cup. He will be competing in both the Sprint and Endurance Cup of the prestigious GT series.

The growing GT championship series will give more opportunities for the young driver to fly the Filipino flag as the rather limiting field of Formula 1 has only 22 seats being sought after by thousands of drivers globally.

Stockinger began his international motorsport campaign in the Formula BMW Pacific and selected races of the Formula BMW Europe series. He then moved on to compete in the Formula Renault UK championship in 2009 and 2010 before he advanced to GP3 with Atech CRS GP and later Teddy Yip Jr. led Status Grand Prix where he scored a race win in Monaco.

He later qualified to join the Lotus F1 Junior Team, a driver development program to scout for possible future Formula 1 candidates. He drove two and half seasons of Formula Renault 3.5 (2013-2015) under Lotus before being reunited with Status Grand Prix. He finished 9th overall in the 2014 Formula Renault 3.5 championship.

2015 saw Stockinger compete in the ultra-competitive GP2 Series which is considered as a step away from the Formula 1 World Championship. GP2 champions and top drivers usually move up to Formula 1 either as full race drivers or reserve drivers. However he only managed to finish 26th overall.