Bob Akin Award Winner Fidani, Bell and Kern Confirmed Aboard No. 13 Corvette Z06 GT3.R
DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. – Having rebranded and relaunched as 13 Autosport prior to 2026, Orey Fidani’s squad heads into its second season as 13 Autosport with a bounce in their step. Fidani is on the heels of winning his third consecutive Bob Akin Bronze Cup Award in the IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship Grand Touring Daytona (GTD) class and will seek a fourth straight in 2027.
Fidani and Matt Bell will again share the No. 13 13 Autosport Corvette Z06 GT3.R for the full season, with Lars Kern confirmed once more for the IMSA Michelin Endurance Cup rounds.
“I’m incredibly proud of this team and everything we’ve accomplished together,” Fidani said. “We have a special group of people at 13 Autosport, and what we achieved this year is a reflection of how hard everyone has worked. Winning the Bob Akin Award again, finishing fifth in the GTD Championship and earning another opportunity to go to Le Mans are things we’re very proud of, but we’re not done. There’s a lot more we want to accomplish together, and I’m really excited about what we have planned for 2027.”
They were relieved to emerge victorious again over longtime Bob Akin Award sparring partner Brendan Iribe in the No. 70 Inception Racing Ferrari 296 GT3 EVO. Fidani scored 1,580 of his 3,110 Bob Akin Award points in Michelin Endurance Cup races to Iribe’s 1,400 of 3,100; that propelled Fidani to win by just 10 points and secure an IMSA invitation for a return trip to the 24 Hours of Le Mans.
“Everyone’s been working really hard for this and we’re already excited to go back to Le Mans,” Fidani said. “I’d have to say this more satisfying than a year ago. But it was very close between our two teams. This was a tough one for sure and very close between us and them. But we came (out) on top and made it happen once again. I probably did about 10,000 steps in the last hour, walking all over down the pit lane because I couldn’t stand in one spot anymore. But now that it’s over, it’s incredible how all this work paid off.”
Bell added, “It’s great to go back to Le Mans. We’ve had fantastic competition with the 70 three years in a row and the 16 (No. 16 Myers Riley Motorsports Ford Mustang GT3) though they had a little bit of a less lucky year. So we’ve always appreciated the competition for the Akin Award, and it’s good with such strong competition to do the three-peat and get the Le Mans entry again, which was the main goal of the season. Everybody’s super happy to go back. We’re really motivated to go and have a good, strong run at Le Mans. We felt really, really competitive this year and contact took us out of the race. So it made us all even hungrier to go back and clinch the Bob Akin Award. Really, really happy about the outcome of that side of the championship.”
The 13 Autosport pairing shifted from driving Le Mans Prototype 3 (LMP3) machinery at the end of 2023 to GT3 specification machinery for 2024, as a customer pairing driving the Corvette Z06 GT3.R.
There’s been methodical improvement each year. In 2024, the pairing had a best finish of fifth in GTD and finished 10th in the points. Fidani, Bell, Kern and then-fourth driver Marvin Kirchhoefer secured a famous class victory at the 2025 Rolex 24 At Daytona en route to ninth. In 2026, they improved that by four positions as they finished fifth in the full GTD standings with a best finish of third among all GTD cars at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Speaking at the start of the year at Sebring International Raceway, following the 13 Autosport team rallying to fourth at Daytona in its win defense attempt after a fire during practice, Fidani spoke about his increased comfort level driving Chevrolet’s GT3 contender.
“I’m definitely a lot more comfortable,” Fidani said. “And I think a lot of that’s just came from spending time driving the car, and then our engineering team and our crew has done a very good job with the car. The more you do things, the better it is.”
More noteworthy, Fidani spoke of the long-desired goal for 13 Autosport to stick around. He’s from Etobicoke in Ontario; the team’s new shop is in the Toronto area in Mississauga.
“Everyone’s pumped,” he said. “This plan was just to take it from what it is and step it up to the next level. I’m planning to be around for a long time, so I think it just made sense for me to take in all the overheads and take over the team, and you know, now we can push things a little further. We have a nice new shop being built. It makes everyone’s jobs a little easier, cleaner, more comfortable.”