Two Aston Martin Racing LMGT3 crews now all set for Spa 6Hrs tomorrow
Despite having persistent rain at the circuit in the build-up to this weekends event, the weather had so far been glorious and that is the forecast again for tomorrows six-hour race – but Spa being Spa, absolutely anything could happen!
As per previous rounds of the Championship so far, just the #27 Heart of Racing and #777 D’Station Racing teams represent the Aston Martin Racing brand within the WEC as full season entries as driver crews Ian James, Alex Riberas, Daniel Mancinelli and Clement Mateu, Erwan Bastard and Marco Sorenson (respectively) each looked towards Spa to consolidate their Champiosnhip positions after their mixed bag of results from the previous round at Imola and their podium winning results at the season opener in Qatar.
With so many new factors determining this season’s LMGT3 class to that of last year’s finale for the GTE class, the earlier Free Practice sessions were all about bedding both the new Vantage LMGT3 and their new drivers (where applicable) into their optimum performance window in time for today’s Qualifying and Class Hyperpole Sessions. Mancinelli finished the three Free Practice sessions eighth fastest overall in LMGT3 after his FP1 session.
With the teams bronze drivers of James and Mateu each qualifying their respective cars this afternoon, track limits again came into play as the #777 had its best opening two laps deleted whilst James also had had all of his completed laps deleted for the same reason, leaving the #27 car still with no time set with just over three minutes remaining.
Whereas James was able to enter two last gasp laps to climb up first from last in class to P7 before rounding off the session in P4, the #777 car of Mateu was unfortunately not able to do the same as the Japanese lead squad would Qualify to tomorrows race down in P15 out of the eighteen class runners.
For James, that meant for an additional few more laps within Hyperpole within which he could try to elevate their position still further, but that session was interrupted with a nasty looking accident for the #92 Manthey PureRacing Porsche at the top of Raidillon.
With the session clock halted whilst that red flagged incident was cleared and the circuit barriers restored, that allowed the remaining nine runners just over seven minutes. Again losing another lap to track limits, the #27 Heart car would eventually claim P6 in class for tomorrow's race.
The six hours of Spa Francorchamps is due to start at 13:00hrs tomorrow and it will not disappoint!!
UPDATED
Both Aston Martins move up a grid slot after the subsequent disqualification of the #95 United Autosport McLaren for being underweight - #27 now starts P5 and the #777 P14.
Friday, May 10, 2024 |
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Two new Aston Martin Vantage GT3s go again at this weekends second round of the GT World Challenge Asia
Having started out in Malaysia in mid-April, the #777 D’Station Racing AMR Vantage GT3 and again the first of two such cars competing under the AMR banner as the #8 Earl Bamber Racing supported car is again also present.
The opening rounds at Chang International were difficult affairs for the #777 Pro-Am entry of Satoshi Hoshino and Tomonobu Fujii as well as the #8 Am class car of Setiawan Santosa with a P4 in class the pick of the bunch in the opening hour-long race for the #777.
Not racing this year in either their domestic Super Taikyu or Super GT Series, these rounds of the only race mileage that Hoshino will be getting ahead of him taking a place within the teams #777 LMGT3 car at this year’s Le Mans 24 Hour.
This weekend will again see two-hour long races.
Photo credits – Team / social media / Series
Wednesday, May 08, 2024 |
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Three new Astons for second round of FFSA GT4 Series this weekend
The opening round of the series from Nogaro back in late March saw both the Mirage Racing and Racing Spirit of Lemans AMR teams enter two cars apiece but this weeks provisional entry list for round two shows two from the RSLM team and a solo entry from the Mirage team. That’s mainly come about from their previous second car just getting some race mileage in before the start of their own GT4 European Series commitments the weekend after!
However, who we do have is the return of Stanislav Safronov and Aleksandr Vaintrub aboard their new 2024 #7 Mirage Racing AMR Vantage GT4 and the two #74 and #92 Racing Spirit of Leman AMR’s of Victor Weyrich/Matteo Villagomez and Clement Dub/Ronald Basso respectively who will also be fielding their new 2024 specification Vantage’s again.
Last time out at Nogaro saw promising qualifying pace although it was only the two Racing Spirit of Leman cars that came home with class podium finishes at the end of either hour long race.
Whilst the pair of Mirage cars only finished at best P5 in class with either their DNF or DNS in the other, the #74 car of Weyrich and Villagomez secured a P2 silver class finish in race 2 whilst the #92 car earned themselves a P3 Am class finish in Race 1.
Despite the numbers, this weekend’s will just an exhilarating as the last one!
Photo credits – teams / social media
Wednesday, May 08, 2024 |
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Last weekend's racing round up in brief
For us at The-Advantage, it was equally busy off track too so this report will unfortunately be just a quick round up of both the highs and the lows of last weekend’s events as this weekend’s events come steam-rollering towards us.
The ‘pick of the crop’ would have to be the Racing Spirit of Lemans much deserved podium finish after the second round of their European Le Mans Series endeavours at the Paul Ricard circuit in southern France.
Having qualified their #59 AMR Vantage LMGT3 fourth in class, the driver combo of Derek DeBoer, Casper Stevenson and Valentin Hasse-Clot ended that four-hour race third in class to lift their championship position up to fifth in class at this early stage.
The #97 Grid Motorsport by TF AMR Vantage LMGT3 of Martin Berry, Lorcan Hanafin and Jonny Adam enjoyed something of a better race weekend than that of Barcelona last month as the team had to prepare a new chassis for the team for this weekend after the horrors of Spain. Unfortunately for them, their combined efforts only earned them another P7 finish in class to now sit P9 in class.
Within the supporting Le Mans Cup Series, the Blackthorn AMR team ran their first race within the series for drivers Claude Bovet and David McDonald after they had to sit out their opening round in Spain due to then unavailability of new chassis parts.
Running on back-to-back race weekends with the British GT Championship, this race was the first time that the team had encountered the latest Michelin control tyre over that of the Pirelli in SRO Series, which brought problems of its own ahead of last weekend’s second round. The #91 car would eventually finish P9 in class.
Similar tyre issues were apparent for the D’Station Racing AMR Vantage GT3 of Tomonobu Fujii and Charlie Fagg (deputising for Marco Sorenson) as they raced at the second round of the Super GT Series from Fuji.
Having Qualified P22 out of twenty-seven GT300 entries, the #777 car would eventually finish P16 in class but a lap down to the class leaders.
There were race debuts for new AMR powered crews in both the Thailand Super Series opener at the Chang International was well as for Lazarus Corse in the Italian GT Series within their older specification Vantage GT4 and GT3 chassis respectively.
Competing within the Earl Bamber Motorsport prepared Team New Zealand Vantage GT4, drivers Graham Orsett and Ananthorn Tangniannatchi endured something of a challenge race weekend, eventually finishing P12 in their fourteen strong class in race one before a DNF in race 2.
In Misano meanwhile, the Lazarus Corse AMR of Mattia Di Guisto and William Alatalo ran an improving race weekend, finishing P18 in race one before an improved P12 out of their twenty-three strong grid.
At the end of all of that, we still had Aston Martin entries within the SRO America GT America, GT4 America and GT World Challenge America Series from Sebring International in Florida.
Like the opening rounds at Sonoma last month, these series are bolstered by the presence of the Heart of Racing, Flying Lizard and Prosport Racing teams and their varying AMR Vantage GT3 and GT4 cars.
Within the topflight GT World Challenge Series, just the #8 Flying Lizard Vantage GT3 of Elias Sabo and Andy Lee took part despite early indications that Jason Bell would race within that series alongside AMR factory driver Henrique Chaves. Instead, Bell used Chaves’ knowledge to help his own development within the solo driven GT America Series. The #8 car only managed a P6 in class finish at the end of race 1 before another DNF ended their weekend early.
As previously posted, the Heart of Racing team came away from Sebring with a hat trick of race podiums within their GT4 series as Gray Newell, Newell and Roman De Angelis with Hannah Grisham and Hannah Greenameier all secured class podiums throughout the two-race weekend.
For the remaining AMR entries of Tim Savage (#007 GT America) and Todd Pariott (#13 GT America) each suffered either driver through penalties for incident responsibility or mechanical damage after contact with other cars that blighted their weekend. Hopefully better will come for all concerned later this year.
Finally, Comtoyou Racings AMR debut within the GT World Challenge Europe Sprint Cup sadly went as one to forget as their three Vantage GT3 entry at Brands Hatch couldn't deliver upon their early promises.
Despite starting from the front row in race 1, their #007 Pro class entry failed to finish whilst both their #21 Gold Class and #12 Silver entries could do not better than P5 in class over the weekend's two races.
So apologies for the briefness of these round ups – we are frantically getting ready for our annual trip to Spa Francorchamps and the WEC this weekend after all!!
Photo credits – Teams / Series / social media
So apologies for the briefness of these round ups – we are frantically getting ready for our annual trip to Spa Francorchamps and the WEC this weekend after all!!
Photo credits – Teams / Series / social media
Tuesday, May 07, 2024 |
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More podium success in latest SRO America rounds for Heart of Racing at Sebring
Hannah Greenemeier was the first to qualify, taking third in the Pirelli GT4 America AM category, which also marked her first official qualifying SRO outing after qualifying was canceled at the Sonoma Raceway event weekend.
During the Saturday afternoon Pirelli GT4 America race, Greenemeier was quick to move up to second before a full course caution came out five minutes into the 60 minute race. Greenemeier retained her second place position when the field saw the green flag again. The young driver from Colorado handed the Aston Martin Vantage GT4 to her co-driver Hannah Grisham, who crossed the finish line in fifth.
“Overall it was a good weekend,” said Greenemeier. “We definitely did not have as much pace as we would have liked, but in the end it was a good points weekend. So now we'll just move on to COTA in a couple of weeks and just try and keep up the good point races each weekend and see where we end up in the championship.”
Grisham was second to qualify on Saturday for Sunday’s afternoon race but after being unable to get a clear flying lap, Grisham qualified eighth in the AM category.
Grisham was first behind the wheel of the No. 26 Aston Martin Vantage GT4 for the second race of the weekend on Sunday. Grisham was quick to start charging forward from eighth. The California driver handed the Aston Martin off to Greenemeier in fifth place with a little under 30 minutes to go. The duo made up two spots on the pit stop landing Greenemeier in third for the remainder of the race.
Grisham was second to qualify on Saturday for Sunday’s afternoon race but after being unable to get a clear flying lap, Grisham qualified eighth in the AM category.
Grisham was first behind the wheel of the No. 26 Aston Martin Vantage GT4 for the second race of the weekend on Sunday. Grisham was quick to start charging forward from eighth. The California driver handed the Aston Martin off to Greenemeier in fifth place with a little under 30 minutes to go. The duo made up two spots on the pit stop landing Greenemeier in third for the remainder of the race.
“Today was really strong, we started pretty far in the back but were able to make our way towards the front of the pack,” said Grisham. “We ended up with the Hard Charger Award and made it up to P3. So we're really happy about that. A huge thank you to the Heart of Racing Team and Hannah. Next is to continue the momentum into COTA and hopefully to the championship.”
“The Hannahs” earned the Super Fuel Hard Charger Award for the race after making up twelve positions on the entire field.
Gray Newell qualified first for the No. 24 Aston Martin Vantage GT4 entry, setting the eighth fastest lap in the Pirelli GT4 America PRO AM category.
After a review of the start on Saturday’s afternoon race, Newell was forced to a drive through penalty after being judged to have jumped the start forcing the Aston Martin to rejoin the field in ninth. Roman De Angelis was next up behind the wheel with 30 minutes remaining. During the pit stop, the No. 24 Aston Martin Vantage GT4 was penalized for a pit stop time infringement, as a result 1.13 seconds was added on to the Aston Martin’s finishing time. Just after the 30 minute mark, De Angelis was forced to a second drive through penalty because the first drive through penalty was served as a caution came out and therefore it didn’t count. De Angelis crossed the finish line in sixth.
De Angelis qualified second for the Newell / De Angelis pair, scoring a starting position of second for Sunday’s afternoon race. De Angelis was able to maintain his starting position through his stint of 30 minutes before handing the Aston Martin off to Newell, who was able to keep the position through the remainder of the race scoring the duo’s second podium of the season.
“Really happy to leave Sebring with a podium finish in race two,” said De Angelis. “The team and Gray both did a great job executing, definitely outperforming with the cards we were dealt this weekend. Race one was quite unfortunate with two drive through penalties, but we’re still in the championship fight, so I'm looking forward to getting some points back in COTA!”
On Saturday morning, Newell qualified third for Saturday’s afternoon GT America powered by AWS race. Newell was able to maintain position when a quick caution came out just four minutes into the 40 minute race. Just five minutes later the track went back to green flag racing where Newell remained in third place until he took the checkered flag.
Race two for GT America powered by AWS took place Sunday morning with Newell starting from third, a position decided by his fastest lap from Saturday’s race. The 40 minute race stayed green for its entirety, Newell crossed the finish line third. Newell was able to maintain his championship points standings at second with his two third place finishes on the weekend.
The Heart of Racing team will be back in action next weekend with IMSA at WeatherTech Raceway Laguna Seca and WEC at Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps before heading to Circuit of the Americas May 17-19 for the next round of Pirelli GT4 America and GT America powered by AWS.
Source material/Photo credits - HoRT
Monday, May 06, 2024 |
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Next stop Laguna Seca for both IMSA and Michelin Pilot Challenge
Similar to the last round of the IMSA Series at Long Beach, this coming weekend’s round will again see just the topflight GTP Class but this time alongside both the GTD and GTD Pro classes to make up a combined grid of thirty-four cars with all bar ten being GTD based entries.
Like last time out at Long Beach three weeks ago, the FIA World Endurance Championship again impacts upon the driver roster for both Championships with the Heart of Racing team having to run their adaptive crews as a consequence of that diary clash. Mario Farnbacher again pairs up with Ross Gunn aboard the team’s #23 GTD Pro entry as Alex Riberas will be at Spa Francorchamps whilst Roman de Angelis will again pair up with his temporary Magnus Racing co-driver Spencer Pumpelly for the same reason with Marco Sorenson.
That means joining these two Vantage GT3 crews will be up to six Vantage GT4 crews of the supporting Michelin Pilot Challenge Series who will compete at their third round of the season having so far visited Daytona and Sebring.
Having not run since Sebring in mid-March, many crews have looked for racing opportunities elsewhere in North America and Todd Coleman is a good example of that after having come to something of a fiery end in Sebring to seek podium winning ways within the SRO Series events in-between.
We see the #16 Skip Barber entry re-appear for the first time since their disastrous Daytona debut where an incident in Free Practice saw their new car damaged beyond repairability in time for that four-hour season opener.
Then within the #19 Van Der Steur AMR, Valentin Hasse-Clot is also away with his WEC obligations with the D’Station Racing team at Spa Francorchamps. Although not driving the #777, the Frenchman is in intrinsic part of their driver coach squad for the team. That means that Rory Van Der Steur will be partnered by Alex Premat this time around.
The #46 Team TGM again sees Paul Holton deputise for the still recuperating Owen Trinkler whilst Ted Giovanis and Hugh Plumb remain unchanged within the sister #64 car. Rebel Rock will still present the only 2024 Evo version of the Vantage GT4 for drivers Frank DePew and Robin Liddell whilst Todd Coleman Aaron Telitz will hope to get their IMSA account together off the mark this time around.
Thanks to results so far, five AMR powered drivers feature within the top ten of the GS Class with Matt Plumb, DePew and Liddell leading an AMR 1-2-3.
Photo credits – Team / Series / Social media
Saturday, May 04, 2024 |
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An unnecessary public mess and cost as NES cancels their second round at the Nordschliefe on the day
This time forced to cancel their planned four-hour second round of the season at the eleventh hour again this weekend, a walk out by many of the track marshals left the Walkenhorst Motorsport and Prosport Racing and half a dozen other entries with insufficient resources to facilitate a safe event – forcing the cancellation of another event by the race organisers.
Sad for the sport, series and teams and crew involved as most had already arrived on site in Germany before the decision was made.
The locally based Prosport Racing team were due to field another mixed Vantage GT3 and GT4 entry for their customer base as personal clashes takes some of them away from forthcoming rounds of the NLS – all ahead of this year’s 24-hour race in early June.
Intending to join them at the circuit were three new AMR Vantage GT3 crews from the Walkenhorst stable (their #34, #35 and #36 N24 entries) who had to make do with just another test day yesterday.
Hopefully, both NLS and NES series can find a way of living together rather than this expensive and unnecessary public mess!
Photo credits - Teams / Social media
Saturday, May 04, 2024 |
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AMR powered racing round ups for this weekends events
Recently, we have been reading about British racer Charlie Fagg rejoining the Japanese based D’Station Racing AMR team as they sort out some of their driver clashes with their factory driver Marco Sorensen.
For this weekend and for all following WEC/Super GT date clashes moving forward, the Brit will join both Sorensen and Tomonobu Fujii within the teams Super GT entry at their home round of Fuji Speedway this weekend and will replace the Dane for the further diary clashes as they prioritise their World Endurance Championship hopes with the factory driver.
Just one round into their Super GT Series return, the #777 AMR Vantage GT3 crew presently rest fifth within the GT300 Teams Championship.
Also racing for the first time this season over in the Far East will be the opening rounds of the Thailand Super Series from the Chang International Circuit.
Having seemingly lost the Viper Niza Racing team to Mercedes over the winter, it appears that the recently announced Team New Zealand Earl Bamber Motorsport entry of Graham Dowsett and Ananthorn Tangniannatchi will this year be the sole AMR entry with their older spec Vantage GT4.
Also racing together for the first time with be the Lazarus Corse AMR Vantage GT3 entry into the Italian GT Championship from Misano.
After something of a very long-winded introduction, the team recently confirmed that drivers Mattia Di Giusto and William Alatalo will be driving what is still an older generation 16A version of the Vantage GT3 a this opening round.
All completed their first test together at a race soaked Misano circuit only a couple of weeks ago and with driver crews getting ever more competent within the series, this will be a hard year for this young duo.
Photo credits – team / social media
Tuesday, April 30, 2024 |
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A frustrating start to their ADAC series for both Walkenhorts and Eastside Motorsport
The first time in a handful of years that the British brand has been represented within the series obviously placed a lot of pressure upon the two young drivers crews of Mike David Ortmann, Denis Bulatov (#34 car) and Chandler Hull and Nico Hantke (#35 car) went up against some big names in GT racing within the sixteen strong grid.
Two decent ‘banker’ results after race 1 saw the #34 car beat their sister car in both Qualifying and at the end of the first hour long race in P9 and P12 respectively and it was hoped that a mid-event Balance of Performance adjustment would benefit the new Vantage GT3.
Indeed, small improvements were the result after Sundays closing race after the #34 again showed itself to be faster than its sister car as both completed an opening race weekend with an improving result package as the #34 came home P7 and the #35 P13 but with both crews scoring valuable Championship points at the end.
The series now moves onto the Hockenheimring early June.
Supporting this series was again the ADAC GT4 Germany Series which this year has just one Vantage GT4 crew within it and this time from the Eastside Motorsport with Zakspeed team with drivers Jan Marschalkowski and Phillip Gogollok.
Running the new 2024 AMR Vantage GT4 for the first time, the ESM crew endured something of a similarly frustrating opening rounds to their GT Masters equivalents in their first GT4 season together in that combination (although both drivers fully conversant with the series) as they brought home a P8 and a P14 finish at the end of their two-hour long races despite running within the top five during the early Free Practice sessions.
The next round for this series will however be earlier, at the Lausitzring in late May.
Photo credits – Teams / social media / ADAC
Tuesday, April 30, 2024 |
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#888 TLM Racing Aston Martin secures another class double in WRL
Having taken what was on track two overall wins last time out at Barber before post-race penalties struck them from the order from race 1, this weekend’s eight plus seven-hour affair saw the #888 crew secure what was again on track a third in class and first in class before an earlier contact saw the crew again lose out on a class win to leave them settling for a pair of P3 finishes.
Whilst they succeeded, fellow #172 TLM Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT4 with the Hamman family crew as well as the 89X Motorsport AMR did not fare so well as an exhaust issue for the #89X car saw them miss out on race 1 whilst the #172 stopped two thirds through.
Whilst the #89X car was able to start race 2 on Sunday, the #172 TLM was not.
The next round of the series due at Daytona in early June has now been cancelled due to unscheduled track maintenance.
Photo credits – Teams / social media
Monday, April 29, 2024 |
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A full set of 2024 Aston Martin Vantages hit the track ahead of tomorrows Silverstone 500
Unfortunately, gone were the dry track and warm springtime temperatures of yesterday to be replaced with sullen skies with rain falling even before the cars hit the track for this morning’s Free Practice as well as absolutely freezing temperatures.
Despite this, the British racing fan is a hardy one and a healthy number of those were still seen walking over the bridge and into the heart of the Northampton Circuit for today’s Free Practice and Qualifying sessions.
Walking the pit lane this morning, all five Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT3’s and GT4’s were this time all ship shape and Bristol fashion as the Blackthorn AMR team showed off their new 2024 cars for the first time in anger. Looking at both, the #87 car of Giacomo Petrobelli and Jonny Adam was a converted 16A whilst the #10 car of Matt Topham and Josh Rowledge was a brand new 38A addition.
With the reduced grid of now forty-one cars having lost one McLaren GT3 during yesterdays private testing, full wets were the initial order of the day as the forecast remain ominous and drivers went out looking to see just where the grid laid. Soon seeing cars washing out at Copse as the track dried and the wets struggled, it was of no surprise that many went for slicks but those who did (like Jamie Day within the #7 Forsetti Motorsport GT4, soon came back in for wets as the rains returned for the end of the session.
Despite this, the #87 Blackthorn car was fourth quickest with the #97 Beechdean AMR of Andrew Howard and Jessica Hawkins in eighth (P3 within their own Silver-Am class) whilst the #10 car was just happy to sign off an FP1 session without incident!! The two Forsetti GT4’ meanwhile finished their mornings work fourth overall in GT4 and first within their Pro-Am class for the #47 Marc Warren/Will Orton combo whilst Mikey Porter and Day finished that session P7 in GT4 and P4 in their Silver Class.
Free Practice 2 (now called Pre-Qualifying) was a similar affair as all three GT3’s did a siting lap before returning to pit lane for adjustments, back out, more adjustments before the session was some minutes old before any of them had done a timed lap. A short break was later in order as the #61 Mustang ground to a halt down the Hanger Straight, eventually bringing out the red flag but within five or six minutes the remaining cars were back out again.
As that session drew to a close, the #97 Beechdean car of Howard was to go a little off piste with an unceremonious three-hundred-and-sixty-degree spin coming out of Maggots. It would have been a perfect ten for artistic impression had he been able to straighten the car up again to face the way he was going but another one eighty-degree spin put paid to that. Still, no damage and the session was nigh on done for them anyway, so they lived to fight another day.
At the end of that session, the #87 Blackthorn car was again the fastest Aston Martin in P6 overall but the two silver-am contesting Aston’s had traded places with the #10 pipping the #97 for honours by just over half a second whilst the two GT4’s from Forsetti continued much where they had left off this morning.
Going in Qualifying and with tomorrows race being a single three-hour affair, it was back to the Championships aggregated process with each driver running a ten-minute session before the sum of their times determined their starting order tomorrow. As usual, the GT3 Am’s started before the second driver and much the same in GT4.
Despite the preferences of some at the GT4 end of the pitlane, the track was now bone dry, so slicks were the only option as each session ran their turn. Again, the sessions ran incident free although Warren was the only AMR driver to have a lap time dropped due to exceeding track limits – other crews did that of course but the other nine drivers ran clean laps!!
The nett result was that in GT3, the #87 Blackthorn car remained the fastest Aston Martin and will start tomorrows race from P9 (P8 in Pro-Am), the #97 Beechdean next fastest in P12 (P3 in Silver-Am) and the #10 Blackthorn P19 overall (P7 in class).
Then in GT4, the #7 Forsetti was again fastest out the pair and will start from the second row in P3 whilst the #47 Pro-Am car will start P7 overall and P3 in class.
A three-hour race and mandatory minimum timed stops to be made in addition the success penalty stops earned by both Forsetti crews from the last race at Oulton Park. It will be entertaining!!
Saturday, April 27, 2024 |
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