After a well-needed break of over a month, the teams and drivers taking part in the LG Super Racing Weekend series will head for new territory, the 'Enzo e Dino Ferrari' circuit in Imola, Italy, which will host a round of the multi-platform series for the very first time.

The circuit, located to the east of Bologna, hosts the San Marino Formula One Grand Prix every year. It is 4930 metres long, with evocative corner names such as Tamburello, Acque Minerali and Rivazza.

This will be the second Italian round this year, after the first round of the season was held at Monza, near Milan, back in April.

After the Proximus 24 Hours of Spa, the FIA GT Championship will return to the more usual 500 km, three hour format for the eighth round.

However, the field will have a new look for the rest of the season, with two new cars making their debut. French team DAMS will be entering two Lamborghini Murciélago cars, while AF Corse will be running two Maserati MC12 on a non-homologated, non-Championship basis.

Imola will be the fourth Italian circuit to be visited by the FIA GT Championship, after Mugello in 1997, Monza since 1999 and Enna Pergusa in 2002 and 2003.

In Monza, earlier this year, BMS Scuderia Italia drivers Fabrizio Gollin and Luca Cappellari took their first win of the season. Now, on their return to home territory, they are still leading the Championship, adding a further 18 points to their tally thanks to their victory in the 24-hour race.

They have a lead of 13.5 points over their BMS team-mates Bobbi and Gardel, with GPC drivers Babini and Peter a further 8.5 points behind. In N-GT, Ortelli and Collard lead the classification.

Other races this weekend include two rounds of the Formula Renault 2000 Eurocup, the Trofeo Maserati, and the last two rounds of the 2004 European Alfa Challenge. 

After twenty-four hours of close and fascinating racing around the challenging, beautiful and - for once - dry circuit of Spa-Francorchamps, the nr 2 BMS Scuderia Italia Ferrari 550 Maranello was victorious, having fought all the way against the nr 11 GPC Giesse Squadra Corse Ferrari 575 M Maranello.

Third place overall went to the leading N-GT car : last year's victor, Freisinger Yukos Motorsport, ahead of the German team's two other Porsche 996 GT3-RS cars.

The early challenges from the fast-starting Vitaphone Saleen S7 and the Group 2 leading BMW M3 GTR, were not able to prevent this year's seventh round of the FIA GT Championship going to Ferrari.

BMS Scuderia Italia now has more than twice as many points than its nearest rival, GPC Giesse Squadra Corse, with JMB Racing a further seven points behind.

In N-GT, Freisinger Yukos Motorsport is in a similar position, having a lead of 44.5 points over their sister team, Freisinger Motorsport, with GPC Giesse Squadra Corse third and Proton Competition fourth.

After racing without weight at Spa, there will be some very heavy cars at Imola. Gollin and Cappellari will be back on 100 kg in their nr 2 Ferrari 550 Maranello, while Bobbi and Gardel will have 45 kg. The nr 11 GPC Ferrari 575 M Maranello will have 85 kg, with the nr 17 JMB Racing car on 70 kg. The nr 5 Saleen S7 goes down to 30 kg.

In N-GT, the nr 50 car will be the first to carry the 'bonus' handicap weight for a car which manages to win while carrying the maximum handicap weight. Ortelli and Collard's wins in Donington and Spa put them up to 75 kg for Imola. The nr 99 Porsche will carry 50 kg, with the nr 77 on 35 kg.

New cars which are new race-by-race entries, or returning after missing a round, will carry 60 kg in the GT category, or 30 kg in the N-GT, unless their drivers have higher personal penalty amounts, such as AF Corse's Mika Salo, who has 65 kg after second place at Spa.

Giesse Squadra Corse's team manager, Batti Pregliasco, has announced that as Fabrizio De Simone will be racing for AF Corse, they will have, in his place in the nr 62 car, the Maserati test driver Iradj Alexander.

Alexander, from Switzerland, previously drove for JMB Racing on a number of occasions, finishing on the podium at Enna Pergusa in 2002.

After winning the Donington race with Karl Wendlinger in the nr 17 JMB Racing Ferrari 575 M Maranello, Brazil's Jaime Melo missed the Spa round, but will return for Imola.

The car finished in a fine fourth place in the Proximus 24 Hours of Spa, and Wendlinger is lying seventh in the drivers' classification, with Melo 13th.

The car will have 70 kg penalty weight, being Melo's score after Spa. Bert Longin will share the nr 18 Ferrari 575 M Maranello with Russian driver Sergey Zlobin and Britain's Chris Buncombe. Matteo Malucelli, a race-winner for JMB in the Italian GT Championship, will race alongside Antoine Gosse and Peter Kutemann in the nr 19 car.