In a thunderous opening to Sonoma Raceway’s 2025 season, The Ferrari Challenge North America returned to the iconic track bringing along for the first time The Patriots Jet Team Airshow, providing an abundance of prestige, horsepower, and most importantly of all, noise.
On March 8, Sonoma welcomed multiple generations of Ferrari race cars including the newest generation of racers, the 296 Challenge. Debuting in 2024, the $650,000 track-only monster is based on the road going Ferrari 296 GTB Hybrid. Dropping the hybrid powertrain of the road model, the 296 Challenge Keeps the 690 horsepower V6 replacing the V8 twin turbo 488 Challenge EVO.
The prestigious 2.52 mile 12-turn track located about 50 miles north of Hayward nestled in the heart of wine country provides a beautiful open paddock and a great place for hiking, socializing, eating, and of course watching races. As a bonus, when not watching cars go around the track, you can watch and listen to the infamous Sonoma Raceway sheep herd who definitely have no issue making themselves known.
The entry fee for the event was $35 for adults, with free admission for children ages 12 and under. General parking is included with the entry fee and tickets don’t have assigned seating. You can sit anywhere and have open access to the concourse and paddock, where you can explore to your heart’s content.
Ferrari Challenge North America was started in 1994, and is a six round racing series consisting of two classes: Trofeo Pirelli, and Coppa Shell, broken up into Pro and Amateur designations. The event also allows private owners of other track focused supercars to get some laps in with the Club Competizione GT, part of the Ferrari Corse Cliente (Racing Clients) Program.
While both the Trofeo Pirelli and Coppa Shell races only use The Ferrari 296 Challenge car as their track weapon of choice, the biggest distinction between the two races are the drivers themselves. Trofeo Pirelli consists of much more experienced PRO and PRO-AM drivers, while Coppa Shell drivers referred to by S and S-AM (AM for “Amateur”) are often novice racing drivers with little to no racing or Ferrari Challenge experience.
With the gates opening at 8 A.M. I arrived around 9 and was immediately taken in by the beautiful soundtrack of the Club Competizione practice session. The thunderous soundtrack of the 488 going full throttle after turn seven into turn eight followed by the pronounced flutter of the turbo’s blow off valve and brutal downshifts were enough to justify the $35 entry fee by itself.
For those unfamiliar with the structure of GT or pretty much any officially sanctioned races, there are at least three main stages.
First, drivers will get at least one practice session, which will actually allow them to test how the car feels on the track, get them familiar at entry and exit speeds for the corners they go around and all in all just get to see how the car feels. This also allows teams to make any necessary changes to the car in order to optimize performance.
The next step after practices are done, is qualifying. Qualifying takes place over a set amount of time, and this is where cars will try to make the fastest possible lap times in order to set their position on the starting grid of the race. The car with the fastest qualifying time will start the race in pole position, or at the front of the grid. Lastly of course, is the race itself.
At 10:10 A.M. the official qualifying for the Trofeo Pirelli class started with two different qualifying sessions; one 17 minute session for amateurs, and one for the pro class. The two qualifying sessions for the Coppa Shell race following. Massimo Perrina with team Ferrari Seattle locked in pole position for the Trofeo Pirelli race with a lap time of 1:30.864 while Mitchell Green of Ferrari Westlake locked up pole in Coppa Shell with a lap time of 1:32.142. With qualifying finished, the grid for the two races was set.
In between the qualifying and the races you are able to walk through the paddock and garages, where there are plenty of food vendors, mechanics furiously working on the cars preparing for the race, and overall just enjoy a friendly atmosphere. They also organized an autograph session where fans can meet and talk to drivers and a grid walk that allowed fans to be able to walk on the track and get up close to all of the competition race cars.
At 2 P.M., the Patriots Jet Team with their Aero L-39 Albatros jets performed amazing aerial acrobatics with massive swooping dives, tight formation flying, and even let off trails of red, white and blue smoke. After the airshow ended, the Italian National Anthem played, (honoring Ferrari’s proud Italian heritage) followed by the American National Anthem and finally the first race was set to begin.
The Trofeo Pirelli Race started slowly as the safety car ( a car that limits the pace of all the racecars and is used to set up the grid) stayed out after the initial lap as a yellow flag was waived which forced the competitors to stay at a slow pace with no passing allowed. Massimo Perrina, who was on pole position, was assessed a 15 second time penalty for accelerating too fast behind the safety car. As the green flag waved, the 30 minute race was officially on. Manny Franco in P3 passed Dylan Medler for P2 in the first lap and held onto that for the entirety of the race. At the end of the 30 minute sprint, while physically still in first place, Perrina dropped down to fourth place and Manny Franco of Ferrari Lake Forest took the win.
The Coppa Shell race started off with a bang as driver Lance Cawley clipped a curb and T-boned driver Henry Hummel sending both off the track and bringing out the safety car and a full track yellow flag, or caution. The limited pace and no overtakes persisted until the green flag was waved and racing was officially resumed with about 15 minutes to go. At the end of the brawl with the checkered flag finally waved, it was Mitchell Green of Ferrari Westlake who started on pole, remaining in P1 and winning the race.
Ferrari Challenge North America has raced annually at Sonoma since 2021 and is also racing at another California track, the legendary Weathertech Raceway Laguna Seca on Sept. 10-14 later this year. If you’d like to watch the races from the comfort of your own couch, the Ferrari Challenge Races are all live streamed on Ferrari’s official YouTube account.
