Audi R8 driver Kwanda Mokoena became South Africa's first black sports car racing champion last year, clinching the South African Endurance title at the season ending Killarney 9-Hour race. Picture: Dave Ledbitter.
After a successful 2022 season, the South African Endurance Championship has been awarded full National Championship status by Motorsport South Africa, the local administrators of the Adrenaline Game.
This fell exactly in line with the short-term goal of the South African Endurance Series, the rights holder to both the South Africa Endurance Championship and South African GT National Championship.
“We wanted to improve the standard of our racing contenders, while affording competitors the opportunity to be crowned as National Champions for both the overall title and the Index of Performance Championship,” said Xolile Letlaka, the first black motorsport promotor in South Africa and South African Endurance Series owner.
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“The Endurance Series delivered the country’s first black and youngest endurance champion last year after Audi R8 driver Kwanda Mokoena sealed the title during the final round at Killarney in the Western Cape.
“That feat will forever be inscribed in South African motorsport history which makes me very proud,” Letlaka added.
“Now that we have achieved this goal, it makes our properties more attractive to sponsors and in turn increases focus on development from our Africa Race Together Foundation.
“Our attention can now turn to my medium-term objective of establishing an All-African Championship which will see us racing in various countries on the continent,” Letlaka added.
The South African Endurance Championship presents races from three to nine hours in duration.
It caters for vehicles ranging from open-top sport cars like the Ligier JS53, GT3 cars including Porsches, Lamborghinis and Audis, modified and standard saloons, plus the Class E Lexus-powered Backdraft Roadsters which feature as a championship within a championship.
Last year’s season-finale 9 Hour race at the Western Cape Killarney circuit saw 43 cars facing the starter. The first round of the 2023 South African Endurance National Championship will take place with the opening round of the South African GT National Championship on 3 and 4 March at Zwartkops Raceway.
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