F1

Charlie Eastwood believes he and Corvette Racing in a stronger place heading into 2025

Belfast driver glad to have programme settled for next year

Charlie Eastwood
Charlie Eastwood has his programme with Corvette Racing in place for next year

CHARLIE Eastwood says it is a great feeling to have his programme for next year agreed already – and believes both he and Corvette Racing are in a much stronger place heading into 2025.

Eastwood begins next season with appearances in the International Motor Sports Association Weathertech Sportscar Championship in America, starting with the Daytona 24 Hours at the end of January.

Joining forces with Alec Udell and Salih Yoluc, he is going to share a DXDT-run Corvette Z06 GT3.R – the same car Eastwood will pilot in the FIA World Endurance Championship (WEC) a month later.

“Doing multiple championships in the same car will help my performances and hopefully the entire team’s performance,” said Eastwood. “We are doing the big five races in IMSA and with Alex and Salih the line-up is super strong and we stand a good chance of doing well in GTD.

“I am looking forward to 2025. It is great to have both WEC and IMSA, which are essentially the two biggest championships in endurance racing anywhere in the world, agreed and in place.”

Corvette Racing; TF Sport; FIA World Endurance Championship; 24 Hours of Le Mans; Le Mans, France; June 15-16, 2024; Corvette Z06 LMGT3.R #81 driven by Tom Van Rompuy, Rui Andrade, and Charlie Eastwood; Corvette Z06 LMGT3.R #82 driven by Hiroshi Koizumi, Sebastien Baud, and Daniel Juncadella (Richard Prince/Chevrolet Photo).
Corvette Racing; TF Sport; FIA World Endurance Championship; 24 Hours of Le Mans; Le Mans, France; June 15-16, 2024; Corvette Z06 LMGT3.R #81 driven by Tom Van Rompuy, Rui Andrade, and Charlie Eastwood; Corvette Z06 LMGT3.R #82 driven by Hiroshi Koizumi, Sebastien Baud, and Daniel Juncadella (Richard Prince/Chevrolet Photo). (Richard Prince, richard@rprincephoto.com/Richard Prince/rprincephoto.com)

The IMSA outings will offer the 29-year-old some all-important seat time ahead of WEC going live in Qatar. This will be followed by rounds in Italy (Apil 20), Belgium (May 10), France (June 14-15), Brazil (July 13), USA (September 7), Japan (September 28) and Bahrain (November 8).

After seeing out a difficult and, at times, luckless WEC campaign earlier this month with a hard-fought first podium finish, Eastwood says he wants to use that performance as a springboard for 2025.

“We had a little bit of misfortune here and there not to get the win but a double podium in Bahrain shows the progress we made with the car. If we arrive in Qatar with the same package and continue on that development path, then there is a very good chance we can win LMGT3,” added Eastwood, who is a former winner of the LMGTE Am class at the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2020, and champion of the LMP2 Pro-Am category in the 2022 European Le Mans Series.

“There were a lot of learnings from 2024; we had some issues at the start of the year which we expected – we knew it would make life difficult as it was a new car – but for the final three events of the WEC season we took some really big steps forward, especially Fuji and Bahrain. 2024 was not the year I had hoped for but I am confident 2025 is going to be a successful one.”