Vantage Racing: Donington British GT race report

Saturday 16th October saw Vantage Racing take part in it’s second British GT race of the season at Donington Park. After the mechanical problems which plagued us during the Silverstone round in August we were keen to get our DBRS9 GT3 car out again before the end of the season to find out just what we could achieve at that level against cars ranging from Ferarri 430 Scuderia and Porsche 997 GT3 R to Ford GTs and Moslers driven by some of the best drivers around. Tom Black and Stuart Hall were the two drivers for the two-hour race and Stuart took the first stint having qualified the car well in fourth place in a time of 1:07.1. The race started with high drama as Stuart could not avoid a spinning Rosso Verde Ferarri on the first lap and went from second down to almost last before he’d even crossed the start-finish line for the first time! However, he set about making up the lost ground and gradually clawed his way back into the leading pack, even inheriting the lead for a short while just before his pit stop at the half-way point. A power steering problem meant that we had to top up fluid during our pit stop took which therefore took longer than most of the competition. Tom therefore set off in 6th place and, despite an extra stop to clean an oil-covered windscreen, managed to consistently drive his times down to a level where he could hold this position until the flag one hour later. As the performance of the GT3 car is much greater than our GT4 Vantages and the races are therefore much more testing, we were pretty pleased with a 6th place at our first serious attempt at this level of racing. A good end to an excellent season and a finish which sets us up well for next year. The full race report can be found at http://www.britishgt.com/ and highlights are shown on both Channel 4 and Motors TV.