• No clear favourite for global glory as title battle continues to fluctuate
• Mercedes-AMG leads by three points from Porsche; BMW also within striking distance
• Global standings after 23 events
The 2025 GT World Challenge powered by AWS season will head into its final stretch of races with three brands vying to be crowned global champion.
Mercedes-AMG leads from Porsche and BMW with seven rounds left to run, though the name at the top continues to change. Indeed, the three German heavyweights have all taken turns out front in a battle that continues to ebb and flow with each race weekend.
The recent run of races began with GT World Challenge Europe resuming its Sprint Cup campaign at Misano on 19/20 July. The Italian circuit has been an ever-present on the calendar since 2015, making this the 11th consecutive visit to the Adriatic coast. During this time Team WRT has been the dominant squad, a theme that continued in 2025.
A winner in 2023 and 2024, Valentino Rossi returned for a one-off Sprint Cup outing at his home event alongside Raffaele Marciello. The two Misano experts combined to take a sensational win under the lights thanks to Marciello's brilliant late-race pass on the AF Corse Ferrari.
They were firmly in the hunt for Race 2 honours, running second on the road when a penalty took them out of contention. Instead, the win went to Garage 59, with Marvin Kirchhöfer and Benjamin Goethe giving McLaren its first GT World Challenge win of the season – and a first European triumph since 2016. BMW took the biggest points haul, though Ferrari, Mercedes-AMG and McLaren also scored well.
In contrast, Porsche did not enjoy an especially strong weekend at Misano. But the Stuttgart marque was considerably more successful across the Atlantic, with GT World Challenge America in action at Virginia International Raceway. After five straight podium finishes without a win, RS1 broke through with a brace of victories courtesy of Jan Heylen and Alex Sedgwick.
This ensured a very healthy points tally for Porsche, though it was not the best-scoring brand at VIR. Strong results for Random Vandals and Turner Motorsports helped BMW to edge its rival over the course of the weekend, while Mercedes-AMG kept up the fight thanks to JMF's runner-up finish in Race 2.
The combined results from Misano and VIR ensured that, for the second time in 2025, two brands were tied at the top of the standings. At this stage Porsche and BMW sat level on 708 points, with Mercedes-AMG just 11 back in third. But the advantage would swing yet again when the battle moved Down Under for the GT World Challenge Australia meeting at Sandown Raceway on 26/27 July.
This was a varied weekend: Ferrari and Aston Martin shared the wins, Audi was the best scorer, and Mercedes-AMG jumped from third in the standings to retake the lead. Race 1 saw Elliott Schutte and Jaxon Evans secure a fourth victory of the season in the Arise-run 296, solidifying their status as one of the Italian marque's biggest global success stories.
Race 2 went to Volante Rosso, which gave Aston Martin its first GT World Challenge win of 2025. Former series champion Liam Talbot was joined by newcomer Jamie Day in the winning Vantage, their combination of experience and youth proving to be potent. Audi squad MPC finished both races as runner-up, while Mercedes-AMG regained its advantage thanks to a pair of P4 finishes from Tigani Motorsport.
On 2/3 August, GT World Challenge Europe was at Magny-Cours for another Sprint round. Having earned its first Endurance Cup win of the campaign at the CrowdStrike 24 Hours of Spa, Lamborghini added a Sprint Cup victory in France. Once again it was Grasser Racing that did the business, with Spa winners Jordan Pepper and Luca Engstler sharing the controls.
They very nearly doubled up in Race 2 but were narrowly beaten by the Garage 59 McLaren of Kirchhöfer and Goethe, who became the first repeat winners of the Sprint campaign. Their margin of victory – 0.156s seconds – was the second closest in series history.
Two weeks later, on 16/17 August, GT World Challenge America reconvened at Road America. Dubbed 'The National Park of Speed', the Wisconsin venue is among the most scenic in the sport. On average, the area sees 33 inches of rainfall per year, though it would be easy to believe that this was the volume that fell during the opening GT World Challenge America race.
The weather caused two full-course yellow periods, followed by a red flag due to lightning in the area. The #91 Regulator Racing Mercedes-AMG of Philip Ellis and Jeff Burton won from the twin Random Vandals BMWs, with half-points awarded due to the reduced distance.
The sun made a welcome return for Race 2, ensuring a more routine contest in which JMF Motorsports claimed top spot for Mercedes-AMG. Michai Stephens fought off Kenton Koch in the Random Vandals M4, the pack having been bunched up by a late safety car. This helped Mercedes-AMG to edge the weekend and stretch its advantage over BMW to 38 points.
But a pair of events on 30/31 August very nearly resulted in another tie at the top. At Okayama, Deng Yi and Luo Kailuo gave Ferrari its first GT World Challenge Asia triumph of the season, converting their Race 1 pole into victory aboard the Winhere Harmony-run 296. They beat a pair of Porsches – from Phantom Global and Origine Motorsport respectively – to win by seven seconds.
The German marque reasserted its Asian supremacy in Race 2 with Lu Wei and Bastian Buus triumphing for Origine, which has accounted for five of Porsche's eight global victories in 2025. JMR’s Corvette was runner-up, further contributing to the American marque's tally. Nevertheless, for the fourth time in five GT World Challenge Asia events, Porsche was the best scorer.
A few hours after the second Okayama race, GT World Challenge Europe ran its penultimate Endurance Cup round of the year at the Nürburgring. The race swung on a full-course yellow period just before the two-hour mark, which hobbled a number of leading contenders. The chief beneficiary was the #98 ROWE Racing BMW, which had been heading for a runner-up finish but grasped its opportunity to seal victory.
The podium featured all three global title protagonists: behind the winning M4 came the Mercedes-AMG Team Mann-Filter and Rutronik Racing Porsche squads. The Stuttgart marque also finished fourth thanks to Schumacher CLRT, ensuring that it took the biggest points haul from the weekend, though there was little to choose between the three German heavyweights at their home event.
The same could be said of the global standings. Mercedes-AMG leads the way with an advantage of just three points over Porsche, while BMW is only 39 off the top. Ferrari appears secure in fourth, followed by Audi and Lamborghini. McLaren and Aston Martin are tied for seventh spot, closely pursued by Corvette. Ford completes the table after enjoying its most competitive weekend of the season at the Nürburgring, where HRT finished third on the road only to be pegged back to sixth by a post-race penalty.
Mercedes-AMG has built its success on consistency; as it stands, the German brand is not the best scorer in any of the four continental series and is only third in terms of races won. Ferrari holds a narrow advantage over Audi in Australia, Porsche is the clear leader in Asia, while BMW tops the table in both America and Europe. Crucially, however, Mercedes-AMG ranks second or third on all four continents.
Whether this will be enough to ensure a seventh successive global title remains to be seen. There are now just seven rounds to run, one for Asia and two each for the other continental series. They take place over five weekends, beginning with an Australia-America doubleheader on 6/7 September. The season-deciding round takes place at Hampton Downs Motorsport Park in New Zealand on 1/2 November.
