Driver Orey Fidani and teammates Matt Bell and Lars Kern will be returning to the GTD Class in IMSA for the 2027 season with the 13 Autosport Corvette Z06 GT3.R. Fidani and Bell will share the driving duties for the full season while Kern joins in for the IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup rounds. A fourth driver could be added for the Rolex 24 at Daytona as well.
“I’m incredibly proud of this team and everything we’ve accomplished together,” Fidani said. “We have a special group of people at 13 Autosport, and what we achieved this year is a reflection of how hard everyone has worked. Winning the Bob Akin Award again, finishing fifth in the GTD Championship and earning another opportunity to go to Le Mans are things we’re very proud of, but we’re not done. There’s a lot more we want to accomplish together, and I’m really excited about what we have planned for 2027.”
Fidani won his third consecutive Bob Akin Award in 2026 which is given to the top Bronze-rated driver in GTD by just 10 points over rival Brenan Iribe who drove the No. 70 Inception Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 EVO. That win secures another IMSA invitation to return to the 24 Hours of Le Mans in 2027.
“Everyone’s been working really hard for this and we’re already excited to go back to Le Mans,” Fidani said. “I’d have to say this more satisfying than a year ago. But it was very close between our two teams. This was a tough one for sure and very close between us and them. But we came (out) on top and made it happen once again. I probably did about 10,000 steps in the last hour, walking all over down the pit lane because I couldn’t stand in one spot anymore. But now that it’s over, it’s incredible how all this work paid off.”
Bell added, “It’s great to go back to Le Mans. We’ve had fantastic competition with the 70 three years in a row and the 16 (No. 16 Myers Riley Motorsports Ford Mustang GT3) though they had a little bit of a less lucky year. So we’ve always appreciated the competition for the Akin Award, and it’s good with such strong competition to do the three-peat and get the Le Mans entry again, which was the main goal of the season. Everybody’s super happy to go back. We’re really motivated to go and have a good, strong run at Le Mans. We felt really, really competitive this year and contact took us out of the race. So it made us all even hungrier to go back and clinch the Bob Akin Award. Really, really happy about the outcome of that side of the championship.”
Since shifting from LMP3 to GTD in 2024, 13 Autosport has shown improvements in each of the years following. In 2024, the pairing had a best finish of fifth in GTD and finished 10th in the points. Fidani, Bell, Kern and then-fourth driver Marvin Kirchhoefer secured a famous class victory at the 2025 Rolex 24 At Daytona en route to ninth. In 2026, they improved that by four positions as they finished fifth in the full GTD standings with a best finish of third among all GTD cars at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
The Canadian squad is currently believed to be the only full season customer Corvette entry in IMSA next year and they have purchased an all-new Z06 GT3.R EVO chassis for the WeatherTech Championship campaign. DragonSpeed has previously announced they won’t be back, while DXDT racing hasn’t yet confirmed their plans for a full season run in IMSA either.
SportsCar365.com also reports that the team will be broadening its racing next year with plans for the Bathurst 12 Hour race in Australia, and other potential European events in addition to Le Mans are also on the table which may include the Nürburgring 24 Hour race.
“The opportunity to race at Bathurst is incredibly exciting, and there are some other things we’re looking at in Europe as well. It’s a really exciting time for 13 Autosport, and I’m glad to be part of it.”
Fidani also spoke about his desire for 13 Autosport to stick around for a while. The team is building a new shop in the Toronto suburb of Mississauga.
“Everyone’s pumped,” he said. “This plan was just to take it from what it is and step it up to the next level. I’m planning to be around for a long time, so I think it just made sense for me to take in all the overheads and take over the team, and you know, now we can push things a little further. We have a nice new shop being built. It makes everyone’s jobs a little easier, cleaner, more comfortable.”
Source:
ISMA.com and Sportscar365.com
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