Vanthoor will contest the three-hour race as a one-off for Century Motorsport aboard its BMW M4 GT3 on the 26-28 April, amid WEC duties for the German producer within the hypercar class.
The drive was initially for Dan Harper, however in March Leung’s former co-driver secured a last-minute call-up for the British GT season in certainly one of Century’s different BMWs – so, Vanthoor was ultimately chosen for Silverstone.
“It will likely be particular,” mentioned Vanthoor of his forthcoming debut, which might be stay and free on Motorsport.television. “ final yr’s efficiency from Darren and Dan, there’s not a lot we are able to do to do higher than that, so for certain we are going to attempt to do the identical.”
Silverstone might be Leung’s first British GT race since clinching the championship within the 2023 season finale having skipped this yr’s opening weekend at Oulton Park.
It got here after he and Harper initially determined to not defend their crown, however a one-off spherical at Silverstone was at all times the plan till the 23-year-old secured a seat for the season.
“I might like to have achieved the Silverstone 500 with Dan,” mentioned Leung, who gained the race with Harper in 2023.
“Circumstances modified and we needed to assess different choices. Thankfully, BMW has a really deep pool of manufacturing facility drivers and Dries was obtainable for Silverstone.”
Vanthoor ought to nonetheless carry loads of qualities although because the 25-year-old is a three-time GT World Problem Europe Dash Cup champion and 2017 Le Mans 24 Hours winner within the LMGTE-Am class.
Picture by: JEP / Motorsport Photos
“Velocity-wise, he’s prime tier,” added Leung. “However I’ve at all times admired his method. I do know he might be flat out at each alternative and that’s one thing I actually recognize.
“We’re not racing for factors, a end result or perhaps a podium, I wish to defend that win and that’s the mentality we’ll have.”
It has been an in any other case gradual begin to Century’s British GT marketing campaign as its greatest end result at Oulton Park was ninth within the first of two one-hour races that weekend.
Elsewhere, Optimum Motorsport is operating a second McLaren 720S GT3 for Silverstone with Le Mans Cup duo Fran Rueda and Andrew Gilbert as its Silver-Am crew.
It’s a part of a 44-car grid for British GT’s second race meet of the season, which additionally options the sequence return of 2011 GT Academy winner Jann Mardenborough who’s sharing certainly one of Group RJN’s McLaren 720S GT3s with Chris Buncombe.
