Wei Fung Shaun Thong 唐偉楓 (Born 1 November 1995 in

Hong Kong Hong Kong ( (US) or (UK); , ), officially the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (abbr. Hong Kong SAR or HKSAR), is a city and special administrative region of China on the eastern Pearl River Delta i ...

, China) is a

racecar Auto racing (also known as car racing, motor racing, or automobile racing) is a motorsport involving the racing of automobiles for competition. Auto racing has existed since the invention of the automobile. Races of various sorts were organis ...

driver from

. Born in 1995, He is the 2017 Blancpain GT Series Asia Silver Cup champion and the

2020 Super Taikyu Series The 2020 Super Taikyu Series is the 29th season of the Super Taikyu Series. The season starts on 23rd March at Suzuka Circuit but was postponed to 4th September at Fuji Speedway is a motorsport race track standing in the foothills of Moun ...

Champion. Thong is the first and only Chinese driver so far to win the Super Taikyu Series title in history. Thong began karting at the age of 14 and participated in various Asian Karting Championships including the Chinese Karting Championship (CKC), Asian Karting Open Championship (AKOC), Hong Kong Kart Club Championship (HKKC) and CIK KF1. By the age of 16 he participated in the Renault Clio Cup China in 2011 as a guest driver and finished twice on the podium. Thong was then chosen by

Formula Racing Development Limited Formula Racing Development Limited or FRD Motorsports (FRD) is a motorsport promoter headquartered in Hong Kong, China which was founded in 1997. It has been the organiser and promoter of several Asian and China based championships, such as ...

to race in the 2012

Asian Formula Renault Series The Formula Renault AsiaCup (formerly known as the Asian Formula Renault Challenge and AFR Series) is a Formula Renault, Formula Renault 2.0 championship held in Asia. The series debuted in 2002 and also held the ''China Formula Renault Challenge' ...

and finished 3rd overall after securing 1 win and 2 podiums at his inaugural season. After his debut season in single seaters, Thong proceeded to Europe for Formula Renault and Formula 3 before moving to the Sportscar / Prototype racing categories. In 2015, Thong joined Audi Sport Customer Racing Asia young driver development program and competes in the coveted

24 Hours Nürburgring 4 (four) is a number, numeral and digit. It is the natural number following 3 and preceding 5. It is the smallest semiprime and composite number, and is considered unlucky in many East Asian cultures. In mathematics Four is the smalles ...

Blancpain Endurance Series The GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup, formerly for sponsorship reasons the Blancpain Endurance Series from 2011 to 2015 and Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup from 2016 to 2019, is a sports car racing series developed by SRO Motorsports Gro ...

Audi Sport TT Cup The Audi Sport TT Cup was a one-make super car racing series by Audi based in Germany first held in 2015. Audi Sport TT Cup cars based on the Audi TT. It was a support series for the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters, replacing the Volkswagen Scirocco ...

, as well as the

Audi R8 LMS Cup The Audi R8 LMS Cup was a One-Design, one-make sports car racing series by Audi#Motorsport, Audi based in Asia. Audi R8 LMS Cup cars were based on the Audi R8#Motorsport, Audi R8 LMS (GT3). History Audi R8 LMS Cup started in 2012 in all around ...

. Thong remains as their selected driver until today with Audi Sport Asia. In 2019 Thong entered full season of

Super GT Super GT (stylized as SUPER GT) is a sports car racing, grand touring car racing series that began in 1993. Launched as the , generally referred to as either the JGTC or the All Japan Grand Touring Car Championship, the series was renamed to Super ...

, becoming the first Hong Kong Driver to enter a full season alongside

Marchy Lee Marchy Lee Ying-Kin (Traditional Chinese: 李英健) is a racing driver from Hong Kong. Born in 1976 in Hong Kong, Marchy started his racing career at just 9 years old and has become one of the top racecar drivers in Hong Kong. He is the first ...

. The pair scored a 100% Q2 Super Pole qualify in their debut season as an International team and remained as the only team to achieve it so far. In 2020 Thong became the first Hong Kong Driver to win the

Super Taikyu Series Super Taikyu (スーパー耐久, ''Super Endurance''), formerly known as the Super N1 Taikyu Series prior to 2005 and N1 Endurance Series prior to 1995, and currently named the Eneos Super Taikyu Series Powered by Hankook for sponsorship reasons, ...

Fuji SuperTec 24 Hours and claimed the overall title after winning 2 races in the season with Hirix Racing. In 2022 Thong joined Helm Motorsport for the Fuji SuperTec 24 Hours only and won his 2nd Fuji SuperTec 24 Hours, becoming the first and only non Japanese driver to win twice and the first driver to win the pinnacle Japan endurance race with 2 different manufacturers (Mercedes AMG in 2020) and (Nismo in 2022).

Career

2012 / Karting

Thong raced in the 2012

Asian Formula Renault Challenge The Formula Renault AsiaCup (formerly known as the Asian Formula Renault Challenge and AFR Series) is a Formula Renault 2.0 championship held in Asia. The series debuted in 2002 and also held the ''China Formula Renault Challenge''. The series is ...

with

, winning 1 race and with 2 podium finishes. Thong finished 3rd in his debut year of single seater championship. Apart from Asian Formula Renault Challenge, Thong also participated in the final round of the Maserati Trofeo MC World Series and finished 6th and was awarded for "The Best Asian Driver".Thong also participated in the

Malaysia Super Series The Malaysia Open is an annual badminton tournament that has been held since 1937. It has been played in various locations such as Johor Bahru, Kota Kinabalu, Kuching, Penang, Selangor, and Kuantan. The event's annual pattern was interrupted three ...

GT Open Class with 2 podium finishes. Apart from car racing Thong also entered the final round of the CIK-FIA KF-1 World Championship held in Macau after finishing 2nd overall in the Hong Kong Kart Club 125cc Class C with 2 wins and 2 other podium finishes.

2013

Thong joined

Fortec Motorsport Fortec Motorsport Ltd. is a motor-racing team that races in the GB3 Championship. The team was bought in 1995 by current owner Richard Dutton. Past drivers for the team include Juan Pablo Montoya, Gianmaria Bruni, Danny Watts, Jamie Green, ...

s squad to race in the

Protyre Formula Renault Championship British Formula Renault Championship referred to one of two Formula Renault championships that were held in the United Kingdom. The main series was Renault Sport UK's Formula Renault 2.0 UK championship which was held from 1989 to 2011 and was gen ...

in 2013 and secured 1 pole position and 1 fastest lap in the final round held in Silverstone. Despite finishing 16th in the championship, Thong showed strong potential by constantly qualifying in top 3 in 2013. Thong also made his debut in the 3rd round of

Asian Le Mans Series The Asian Le Mans Series is an Asian sports car racing endurance series created by the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) and based in Asia. It is the successor to the defunct Japan Le Mans Challenge which folded in 2007 after its second season. T ...

Zhuhai Zhuhai (, ; Yale: ''Jyūhói''), also known as Chuhai is a prefecture-level city located on the west bank of Pearl River estuary on the central coast of southern Guangdong province, People's Republic of China, on the southeastern edge of Pe ...

and won the overall and LMP2 class with OAK Racing in a Morgan / Judd LMP2 prototype. He also made an appearance in the round 7 and 8

as guest driver and finished 5th in round 8 on his debut for the championship. Thong also finished 3rd in his debut visit to the

Macau Grand Prix The Macau Grand Prix ( pt, Grande Prémio de Macau; ) is a motorsport road race for automobiles and motorcycles held annually in Macau. It is the only street circuit racing event in which both cars and motorcycles participate, and one of onl ...

, racing in the

Formula Masters China Formula Masters China, FMCS () (previously known as Formula Pilota China), was a single-seater racing series based in Asia. The series was created in 2011 after the success of the Formula Abarth championship that was created a year before. Event ...

- Macau Grand Prix Invitational race 2013 with

Eurasia Motorsports Eurasia (, ) is the largest continental area on Earth, comprising all of Europe and Asia. Primarily in the Northern and Eastern Hemispheres, it spans from the British Isles and the Iberian Peninsula in the west to the Japanese archipelago an ...

2014

Thong joined

Team West-Tec Team West-Tec F3 is a motor racing team owned by Gavin Wills and John Miller based in Corby in the United Kingdom, the most successful team in the history of the European F3 Open Championship, it also won two drivers championships in the AS ...

for the 2014

Euroformula Open Championship The Euroformula Open Championship (formerly the Spanish Formula Three Championship, European F3 Open Championship) is a junior formula racing series based in Spain. It was one of six national and international Formula Three championships in Europe ...

and won the Winter Series which was held in Paul Ricard, having qualified on pole position and securing a race win with a fastest lap in the Copa Class Dallara F308 / Toyota at all the winter series races. He later move to the main class featuring the Dallara F312 Chassis with Team West-Tec and finished the season with several top 10 result on his debut year in Formula 3. Thong graduated to the main class for the season driving the Dallara F312 / Toyota with Team West-Tec.

2015

In 2015 Thong was signed by Audi Sport Customer Racing Asia to be their first young driver development program talent and aim to promote young drivers to GT Racing. Thong participated in Various championship including the inaugural season of the

, securing 1 win and 2 pole positions in Round 2 held in Norisring and became the only Chinese driver to win or score a pole position in this championship. Moreover Thong also raced in the

driving the Audi R8 LMS Ultra for

Phoenix Racing (Germany) Phoenix Racing is a motor racing team based at the Nürburgring in Germany. The team competes in series such as the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters and FIA GT1 World Championship and was the winner of the 2022 24 Hours of Nürburgring with the c ...

alongside

and

Markus Winkelhock Markus Winkelhock (born 13 June 1980) is a German professional racing driver. He is the son of Manfred Winkelhock and nephew of Joachim Winkelhock, both of whom were Formula One drivers in the 1980s. During his brief Formula One career he led the ...

. Thong is also one of the drivers among the Audi Customer Racing Asia lineup that participated the 2015

under a full Asian lineup for the first time, with

Cheng Congfu Cheng "Frankie" Congfu (程丛夫; pinyin: Chéng Cóng Fū; born August 15, 1984) is a Chinese racing driver. Career Karting In 1996, Cheng raced in karting in China, winning the national championship in 1998 (junior division), 2000 and 200 ...

and

Alex Yoong Alexander Charles Yoong Loong (; born 20 July 1976), is a Malaysian professional racing driver of Chinese and English parentage. Yoong began his career in saloon cars before moving into the Proton one-make series. He later raced in single-s ...

completing the lineup. The full Asian team finishing 12th overall in the team's debut.

2016

Thong is the GT Asia Vice Champion in 2016. Thong and

entered the championship with the 2016 Audi R8 LMS GT3 and secured 2 Wins and 1 Pole Position during the season with only 3 points shy from the Overall title. Same year Thong also returned to the

with the same lineup featuring

and

with the New Audi R8 LMS GT3. However the car retired after hitting technical issues. From 2016 onwards Thong joined GH Motorsports for the

in the new LMP3 category with the

Ligier JS P3 The Ligier JS P3 is an LMP3 Le Mans Prototype. It was created by Onroak Automotive, and named in partnership with former French driver Guy Ligier. It was built to meet ACO LMP3 standards, and is active in various LMP3 championships worldwide, suc ...

. During the season Thong and his team finished 3 times on the podium out of 4 races in total.

2017

Thong remained with

to participate in the inaugural season of the Blancpain GT Series Asia and scored 2 victories in Suzuka, Japan and Shanghai, China respectively. In addition with 4 other podium finishes in Sepang Malaysia, Buriram Thailand and Fuji Speedway in Japan. Thong and teammate

finished the season as the 2nd Runner Up and at the same time crowned as the Silver Cup Champion. Thong also drove for Audi Team Teda in the

with

as a full season entry despite appeared several times as a guest driver in the past years. During the season Thong finished 4 times on the podium including 1 in Sepang Malaysia, 2 in Korea and another one in Zhejiang China. In the End the Hong Kong driver came in 5th in the Championship. The same year Thong returned to the 2017 - 2018

season with Taiwan Beer GH Motorsport from

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the northe ...

in the LMP3 class. Thong and his teammate Hanss Lin 林帛亨 finished 3rd in the LMP3 classification with 3 podiums out of 4 races including Zhuhai 4 Hours, Buriram 6 Hours and Sepang 4 Hours with a

. Thong made 2 guest appearances in

2017 File:2017 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: The War Against ISIS at the Battle of Mosul (2016-2017); aftermath of the Manchester Arena bombing; The Solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 ("Great American Eclipse"); North Korea tests a ser ...

with Audi Hong Kong by Phoenix Racing Asia at Round 3,4 Zhuahai International Circuit and Round.5,6 at Bangsaen Street Circuit in Thailand. Thong finished on the podium in both appearances.

2018

The year started with Thong joining fellow Hong Kong Drivers

Darryl O'Young Darryl Hayden O'Young () is a Canadian-born Hong Kong racing driver. Career Early career O'Young began racing in 1988 at the age of eight. Trained by his father he honed his driving skills in karting winning numerous championships. The highlight ...

Adderly Fong Adderly Fong Cheun-yue (Traditional Chinese: 方駿宇; Pinyin: ''Fāng Jùnyǔ''; born March 2, 1990) is a Canadian-Hong Kong racing driver. His career started in 2004. He is currently competing in the Blancpain GT World Challenge Asia racing ser ...

and

Charles Kwan Charles Kwan Siu-Cheung (Traditional Chinese: 關兆昌, born September 3, 1963) is the most successful Hong Kong racing driver who has competed in the Macau Guia Race, Japan GT Championship, FIA GT Championship, Porsche Carrera Cup Asia, South ...

for the

Dubai 24 Hour The Dubai 24 Hour Race is both a sports car and touring car automobile endurance race held annually at the Dubai Autodrome. It was inaugurated in 2006. Entrants and participants As with all races in the 24H Series, promoted by Dutch promoter C ...

in a brand new Audi R8 LMS GT4 with

. The Hong Kong outfit won the GT4 Class but was later penalised for pitstop infringement and dropped to 2nd in class behind the other Phoenix Racing sister R8 LMS GT4. The same year also saw Thong racing full season in Japan in the

with his usual crew

alongside

and Alex Au in the #82 Audi R8 LMS GT3. The #82 car led by Thong finished 2 times on the podium at the 3 Hours of Sugo and the 5 Hours of Autopolis before Thong and Yoong withdrew from the remaining 2 races of the championship to join

with 2 Brand New Bentley Continental GT3 at the final 2 rounds of Blancpain GT Series Asia, partnering South African driver

Jordan Pepper Jordan Lee Pepper (born 31 July 1996 in Edenvale) is a South African racing driver, currently competing in the Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup. He is the son of former South African Touring Car driver Iain Pepper and younger brother of W Ser ...

2019

The Hong Kong driver returned to the

with

KC Motorgroup KC Motorgroup Ltd, known as KCMG, is an auto racing team based in Hong Kong. Founded by former racing driver Paul Ip in 2007, KCMG has participated in a variety of championships across the world in touring car, sports car, and open-wheel racin ...

using a New Spec 2018 Nissan GT-R GT3 pairing with

Tsugio Matsuda is a Japanese professional racing driver. He has won the Formula Nippon series twice, in 2007 and 2008. He has also competed in the All-Japan Formula Three Championship. Matsuda has also become a regular participant in the Super GT series which ...

Katsumasa Chiyo is a Japanese factory racing driver, currently competing in the Autobacs Super GT Series as a factory driver for Nissan. He is a graduate of the Nissan Driver Development Program (NDDP), and a past champion of the Bathurst 12 Hour race, and t ...

Josh Burdon Josh Burdon (born 5 September 1992) is an Australian professional racing driver and 2016 Asian Formula Renault Series champion.He is currently driving for Hong Kong-based KC Motorgroup in the Intercontinental GT Challenge, Nürburgring Lan ...

and Andrea Gagliardini. The #29 Nissan crew was running strong at 6th before suffering a mechanical failure that forced them to retired after 20 Hours. Thong made his debut in Japan's premier championship

2019 File:2019 collage v1.png, From top left, clockwise: Hong Kong protests turn to widespread riots and civil disobedience; House of Representatives votes to adopt articles of impeachment against Donald Trump; CRISPR gene editing first used to experim ...

with Hong Kong outfit X Works Racing with a 2018 Nissan GT-R GT3. The team was equipped with Yokohama tires and finished 4 times in the points in their debut year at Round.2 Fuji Speedway, Round.4 Buriram Thailand, Round.7 Sugo and Round.8 Twin Ring Motegi. In 2019 X Works and their drivers became the first International entry in GT300 class to successfully score points in Super GT's history. Thong had 2 teammates over the season with

at the beginning of the season and

Shinya Michimi Shinya (Shin'ya) is a Japanese given name, usually for males. It is pronounced as "Shin-ya", not "Shi-nya". Notable people with the name include: *, Japanese curler and curling coach *, Japanese politician *Shinya Aoki (born 1983), professional mi ...

for the second half of the season. At the same year Thong also made two appearances in the

for the Round.3 Fuji 24 Hours and Round.5 5 Hours of Motegi alongside his current Super GT crew X Works Racing using the Audi R8 LMS GT3 in ST-X Class. The crew retired from the Fuji 24 Hours due to mechanical issues which was too severe for repair on spot. Thong rejoined at Round.5 in Twin Ring Motegi and qualified 3rd for the 5 Hours race, in the end the #83 Audi crew won the 5 Hours of Motegi with Thong being the lead driver following by fellow Hong Kong drivers Smart Tse Ka Hing and Philip Tang. This victory marked the team's victory in the championship and also the first foreign team to win in Super Taikyu. Thong made his

return but this time with brand new team K2 Uchino in the premier LMP2 class running the

Oreca 07 The Oreca 07 is a Le Mans Prototype built by French manufacturer Oreca to meet the 2017 FIA and ACO LMP2 regulations. It made its official race debut in the opening round of the 2017 IMSA WeatherTech SportsCar Championship, the 24 Hours of Da ...

/Gibson. K2 Uchino Racing is closely related to the 2018

GT300 champion team K2 Leon Racing. Thong and his teammate Haruki Kurosawa was the only LMP2 team that ran with 2 drivers, meaning Thong being the Silver classification driver will do 2/3 of the race distance. K2 Uchino Racing and Thong secured a podium finish at the season finale at the 4 hours of Buriram, Thailand in just the team's 3rd ever race in LMP2.

2020

Thong returned to

and

with X Works Racing and new team Hirix Good Day Racing respectively. X Works Racing swapped from Nissan GT-R GT3 to the Audi R8 LMS EVO GT3 and remains on Yokohama Tires for their second season. However the season was considered the tougher one due to travel restrictions from the

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease quickl ...

pandemic which cost the Hong Kong outfit to ran the season without their dedicated engineer and mechanics. Thong had several teammates throughout the season including

2005 File:2005 Events Collage V2.png, From top left, clockwise: Hurricane Katrina in the Gulf of Mexico; the Funeral of Pope John Paul II is held in Vatican City; "Me at the zoo", the first video ever to be uploaded to YouTube; Eris (dwarf planet), Er ...

GT300 Champion Kota Sasaki, Takuro Shinohara and Takeshi Kimura due to COVID-19 travel restrictions which led to Alex Au, Thong's planned teammate from Hong Kong being unable to enter Japan due to the closure of Japanese boarder after the pandemic. Thong is the 2020

overall and ST-X (FIA GT3) champion. Thong returned to the championship with new formed Japanese team Hirix Good Day Racing with a 2020 Mercedes AMG GT3 EVO with Daisuke Yamawaki and 2019

GT300 champion

Shinichi Takagi is a Japanese professional racing driver. He won the GT300 class Super GT championship in 2002 and 2019. Career Takagi made his debut in the All-Japan GT Championship (JGTC) in 1998, driving for in the GT500 class. For the 1999 season, he s ...

. Due to COVID the championship had rescheduled the calendar with the Fuji 24 Hours being the season Opener. The Hirix Racing crew won their debut race in the Fuji 24 Hours race in addition with Yuki Nemoto joining for the 24 Hours only and replacing Shinichi Takagi later in the season. The #888 Hirix Racing AMG GT3 EVO came home as the 2020 Fuji Super Tec 24 Hours winner after completing 528 laps in total. Throughout the race the Hirix Racing outfit had a huge fire during on of their routine pitstop, however the car only suffered minor external damage and continued from then. The race was red flagged after torrential rain hit the circuit at night with 7 hours into the race. The race continued after a 3 hours suspension once standing water were cleared and deemed safe to race again by the track marshals and race officials. Round.2 Sugo saw the Hirix Racing crew and Thong finished 2nd overall after starting the 3 Hours from Pole Position, the race was under full green condition even it was suffered from heavy rain throughout the whole race. After this race the #888 crew extended the championship lead at 60 points. The following round at Okayama International Circuit saw the crew suffered from their only DNF of the season when

crashed on lap 9 of the 3 Hours of Okayama which left him a fractured back and wrist, resulting Takagi to withdrew from the remaining races in both Super Taikyu Series and Super GT the same year. He later recovered and returns to the 2021

season. Yuki Nemoto replaced Takagi from Okayama onwards in the #888 Hirix Racing AMG GT3 Evo from then onwards. Round.4 saw the Thong and the Hirix Racing outfit came home with their second win of the season, it also marked Thong's back to back win for the 5 Hours of Motegi after his victory with X Works Racing in 2019. Thong started the race after qualifying 2nd from the grid, he was spun around by his competitor #9 Mp Racing on lap 2 but Thong later recovered and led the race from then onwards. Thong was also responsible for taking the checkered flag and concluded the team and his second win of the season. The second victory also further extended their championship lead. Autopolis Circuit in Kyushu of Japan held the Round.5 and the #888 crew could possibly be crowned as champion if they won this race. Thong and his Hirix Racing team took the checkered flag 4th after suffering from a driver through penalty due to start infringement by his teammate. However the championship lead was still under healthy margin. The final round at Suzuka was cancelled due to the announcement of the Japan state of Emergency due to the increasing COVID-19 cases around the country, hence only the first five rounds would be counted and from then onwards Thong and the #888 Hirix Good Day Racing crew as announced as the 2020 Super Taikyu Series Champion after securing 2 wins, another podium finish and a pole position.

Racing record

Complete GT Asia Series results

(

key Key or The Key may refer to: Common meanings * Key (cryptography), a piece of information that controls the operation of a cryptography algorithm * Key (lock), device used to control access to places or facilities restricted by a lock * Key (ma ...

) (Races in bold indicate pole position; results in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap)

Complete Blancpain GT Series Asia results

(

) (Races in bold indicate pole position; results in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap)

Complete Asian Le Mans Series results

(

) (Races in bold indicate pole position) (Races in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap)

Complete European Le Mans Series results

(

) (Races in bold indicate pole position; results in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap)

Complete Super Taikyu Series results

(

) (Races in bold indicate pole position; results in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap)

Complete Super GT results

(

) (Races in bold indicate pole position; races in ''italics'' indicate fastest lap)

References

External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Thong, Shaun 1995 births Living people Hong Kong people Hong Kong racing drivers Asian Formula Renault Challenge drivers Euroformula Open Championship drivers Audi Sport TT Cup drivers Asian Le Mans Series drivers Blancpain Endurance Series drivers 24H Series drivers European Le Mans Series drivers Super GT drivers OAK Racing drivers TCR Asia Series drivers Formula Masters China drivers Eurasia Motorsport drivers Karting World Championship drivers Formula Renault BARC drivers Fortec Motorsport drivers Phoenix Racing drivers Team West-Tec drivers Nürburgring 24 Hours drivers