German-based Vitaphone Racing are gearing up to run two Maserati MC 12 sportscars this year in the FIA GT Championship.

The news comes hard on the heels of the announcement yesterday that JMB Racing will also run a brace of the Trident's GT1 class contender this season, bringing to four the number of confirmed entries for the FIA GT series. As well as these cars, Racing Box will now campaign an example in the Italian GT Championship, and Maserati Corse, in partnership with Risi Competizione, will appear for the first time in the US-based ALMS series.

It promises to be an exciting first full year on the international race tracks for the famous Maserati name, after an absence from the winner's circle which until Oschersleben last year had stretched back for nearly four decades. The awesome V12-engined MC 12 made its debut in the closing races of the 2004 FIA GT Championship. Second time out it won in Germany, and with another win at the final race, held at Zuhai in China, swiftly under its belt, Maserati laid down a marker that this would be the car to beat in 2005. As such the MC 12-running team's start as clear favourites to win the title.

Vitaphone Racing were a new addition to the burgeoning FIA GT series last year. A single blue-and-black liveried Saleen S7-R was run by the highly experienced Konrad Motorsport for experienced sportscar duo Michel Bartels and Uwe Altzen.

Instantly fast, the Vitaphone Saleen claimed a string of pole positions during the course of the year. However the rapid American beast proved to be highly fragile, and a number of mechanical failures occurred. Despite these setbacks, the car claimed three wins, at Magny-Cours (round 3), Brno (round 5) and Imola (round 8), the last of these saw Altzen and Bartels lead home the two Maserati MC 12s on their debut.

In possibly the most exciting encounter of the year, a second place finish was salvaged at the Donington Park race. The Vitaphone car, recovering from early race problems, had fought back up the field to take the race lead with just a handful of laps remaining.
 

However just two bends from home the blue and black car collided with a slower N-GT class entry, allowing the JMB Racing Ferrari 575 GTC of Karl Wendlinger and Jaime Melo to nip past the ailing machine and snatch an unlikely win.

Rounding out its points scoring finishes in its inaugural year was a 4th place in Dubai, although with the Maserati MC 12 running outside the rules, the team were awarded points for third place. With 44 points Vitaphone Racing claimed fourth place in the team's championship behind BMS Scuderia Italia (159.5 points), GPC Squadra Corse (72) and JMB Racing (60). Altzen and Bartels were jointly placed 10th in the driver's series.

For this year's new challenge with the Maserati MC 12, Michel Bartels has been retained, while official Pirelli test driver Fabio Babini, brings a wealth of development experience with the fearsome car. Last season Babini was also part of the GPC Squadra Corse line-up, pedaling the team's Ferrari 575 GTC to a consistent run of finishes, including a highlight second place finish at the grueling 24 Hours of Spa, the series' showpiece event.

"Our plan was to develop the MC 12 last year into a well balanced vehicle and we already brought the car's first victories," commented Maserati racing boss Claudio Berro. "We only recently received for the MC 12 the final homologation for the FIA GT Championship and so are completely content with the results obtained so far. In our vehicle is still lots of quantity potential and I sure that the Vitaphone Racing team will prove this potential in the 2005 season."

Michael Bartels completed the team's first test in the car last week at Paul Ricard, and commented enthusiastically afterwards, "the Maserati is an impressing racing car. We worked consistently with the MC 12 and could improve the driving times from lap to lap."

Vitaphone managing director Matthias Quinger now looks confidently to the future, "with the Maserati to MC 12 the Vitaphone Racing team brings two very efficient vehicles in the FIA GT Championship to the start and we continue besides outstanding co-operation with our tyre partner Pirelli."

As to who else else will drive for the team, Quinger adds, "we stand at different points with potential drivers in negotiations but will shortly announce our drivers. Already now I can say that everything is set to exceed our successes from 2004, during which we achieved three victories."