With no previous racing experience, Mário Rayford Ferreira made his debut almost at a moment’s notice in the penultimate round of the 2025 PSCI season, in Navarra. Less than a year later, the young Portuguese-American sits third in the Bronze Class, is inside the overall Top 10 of the Porsche Sprint Challenge Ibérica and is contributing to RGB Racing Team’s presence in the Top 5 of the Teams’ Championship.
Some drivers arrive in Motorsport after years of karting, junior formulae and dozens or even hundreds of races. Mário Rayford Ferreira’s path could hardly have been more different. Before making his Porsche Sprint Challenge Ibérica debut, he had never competed in a proper race. There had been a few private tests, curiosity and a desire to try. Actual racing experience, however, was practically non-existent. Until a phone call arrived: “I was called on a Thursday and asked to race. On Friday I got my licence and went straight to the circuit knowing practically nothing. And it went well.”
That was how, almost at a moment’s notice, an adventure began that, less than a year later, has already placed the young Portuguese-American among the leading contenders in the PSCI Bronze Class. And certainly not in a car designed to make life easy for a newcomer. His first major competitive challenge was to tackle Estoril at the wheel of a Porsche 911 GT3 Cup. It was a demanding and memorable experience that definitively opened the door to what would come next: “I loved the end of last year. It was difficult for me to understand Estoril and adapt to the car, but I loved it. It was a very special experience.”
The seed had been planted. In 2026 came the opportunity to contest a full Porsche Sprint Challenge Ibérica season and, with it, a new reality: the RGB Racing Team Porsche 992 GT3 Cup. And Mário found in the 992 a platform that allowed him to accelerate that process: “The 992 is a much better platform than the 991.1. It gives me much more confidence, including under braking, and I feel that I can now learn on a platform that is really suited to that.”
RGB and Miguel Lobo: a team to learn with, a team-mate to grow with
Discovering the Porsche 992 GT3 Cup went hand in hand with joining a team Mário barely knew before the start of the season. Three rounds later, his relationship with RGB Racing Team has become one of the pillars of his development: “At the beginning of the season I didn’t know RGB. Now we’re halfway through the season and they have been impeccable. I love working with them and they have helped me grow a lot technically.”
The young Portuguese-American’s experience also highlights an important characteristic of the Spanish team: its ability to work with drivers at very different stages of their respective careers. Within the same team are drivers already capable of fighting at the front of the Porsche Sprint Challenge Ibérica and a rookie who, less than a year ago, had never competed in a race.
For Mário, that difference in experience is not a difficulty. It is a constant opportunity to absorb information and accelerate his learning: “They have no problem working with a very experienced driver and another who is still learning. They actually like that idea. The engineers have been impeccable with me and I can sit down with them, listen and constantly learn.”
There is also another particularly important figure in this process. In two of the first three rounds of 2026, Mário shared the Porsche with Miguel Lobo, a driver whose speed and experience quickly became a reference point for the rookie. What began as a sporting partnership has since gone far beyond the cockpit: “Bringing Miguel in to race with me this year was one of the best things that could have happened. I’m also very happy with the friendship we’ve built.”
But Miguel Lobo does not make life easy for his team-mate. And that is precisely why Mário appreciates him: “He is acting as my coach and he is tough on me. Sometimes, when we’re in Porto, he gets me out of bed and we go for a ten-kilometre run. He helps me physically, he helps me technically and he supports me in everything.”
The results are beginning to reward that joint effort. Heading into the second half of the season, Mário sits third in the Bronze Class and is inside the overall Top 10, while also making an important contribution to RGB Racing Team’s presence in the Top 5 of the Teams’ Championship.
Estoril taught him how to fight. Valencia showed him he could go further
Looking back at the first three rounds of 2026, Mário identifies two particularly important moments in his development. At Estoril, he truly discovered one of the sensations that no private test can reproduce: fighting directly for position: “I really enjoyed it because I had someone at a similar level to me whom I could race directly. I loved being able to fight constantly with another driver during the race.” Valencia brought something different: overcoming his own limits. The heat turned the third round into an enormous physical challenge. According to information provided by the team’s engineer, the temperature inside the Porsche reached 58 degrees. Mário nevertheless left Valencia with the feeling that he had overcome another barrier: “I think Valencia was the race where I surpassed myself. It was very difficult physically, but it went really well. It was a short and very fast circuit, with a different layout, and I managed to finish just a few seconds away from pole. For me, that was very positive.”
It is not only the speed that is beginning to emerge. It is also the realisation that his own limits are progressively further away than he initially imagined. “The most important thing was to bring the car back to the pits” Perhaps this is the sentence that best explains the scale of the transformation. Mário did not begin 2026 calculating championship positions. He did not set himself the target of finishing on the Bronze Class podium or breaking into the overall Top 10. The plan was considerably simpler: “For me, the most important thing was to bring the car back to the pits, not damage anything and learn step by step, without overdoing it and without trying to drive beyond my limits.”
Three rounds later, he remains faithful to that philosophy. The difference is that results have started to come along the way. Third place in the Bronze Class means that a potential final podium is no longer merely a theoretical possibility. But without changing what remains the priority of his first full season: learning and developing: “I’m very happy with what I’ve managed to achieve in these three rounds. We still have another three ahead of us and I think it’s going to be very good. It will keep getting better.”
Qualifying? Race pace? Tyre management? Overtaking? Racecraft? When presented with several areas in which he might find his greatest room for improvement, Mário chooses another: “Confidence. Confidence in my limit, without a doubt. At this stage, for me it is mainly mental. I have to trust myself so that I can keep pushing harder and not be afraid of losing the car.” Mário Rayford Ferreira has a demanding professional life. Motorsport will inevitably have to coexist with that reality.
But what began with a phone call on a Thursday and a racing licence obtained on a Friday has since stopped looking like a simple experiment: “I have my professional life, but I’m really enjoying entering this world of racing and I want to continue down this path.”
The driver whose first objective was simply to bring the Porsche back to the pits without damaging it is now inside the overall Top 10, sits third in the Bronze Class and is helping RGB Racing Team fight among the leading teams in the Porsche Sprint Challenge Ibérica.