Having only raced in the German DTM Series for just one season last year, it was thought that all four of R-Motorsports Aston Martin silhouetted race cars had been sold into private ownership.

That may have been true but this week sees all four cars appear again appear for sale on the Racecarsdirect.com website via the teams former engine building partner HWA AG. After failed attempts to secure a new engine supplier for the 2020 season, the Swiss based team ultimately announced a termination to their DTM ambitions at the beginning of the year.

Full details can be found https://racecarsdirect.com/Advert/Details/112942/aston-martin-vantage-dtm

A 'tail of two halves' is usually a metaphor reserved for all sports other than motorsport but that is precisely what happened in the second half of the 2020 Bathurst 12hr overnight.

Having already lost five cars to accident damage even before the start of the race including the #62 R-Motorsport V8 Vantage of Marvin Kirchhofer, the level of car destruction sadly continued into the first six hours of the race itself.


The #188 Pro-Am entry from Garage 59 was sadly included in that destruction after Come Ledogar misjudged his entry into the Dipper, clipped the inside kerb heavily to send himself into a spin and a deafening impact with the outside concrete wall and instant race retirement.

That left just the high profile Castrol entry for the #76 R-Motorsport crew of Jake Dennis, Rick Kelly and Scott Dixon in Pro and the race debuting #159 Garage 59 Silver crew of Andrew Watson, Roman de Angelis and Oliver Hart for the remaining ten hours.


Including the #188 Aston, another Lamborghini and Audi suffered similar fate around the top of the mountain as their respective drivers made instantaneous misjudgements that quickly resulted in heavy, race ending impacts with the barriers - thankfully nobody received significant injury.

Initially double stinting both their drivers and tyre, the #159 car cycled through their driver line up and raced their own race in the new for 2020 Silver class having maintained a midfield position overall in the race but between P1 and P3 in class despite all drivers lack of experience of the circuit and car (as was the case for Oliver Hart).


Weather and other meteorological phenomena where now being forecasted for the final third of the race as first a dust storm was expected over the circuit as hot winds increased in speed across the scorched earth of New South Wales. Then there was the imminent threat of rain and thunder storms before the fall of the chequered flag so was getting pretty 'crazy' by this time.

With Hart in the car, the team was 'pinged' by Race Control for the car controller working on the car whilst on pit lane receiving them a 15 second extra hold at their next stop - a fate that several other teams had also been picked up. For the #76 crew, there was little that could be done other than push and 'enjoy themselves' as their lap deficit due to their early front end issues was always going to be too great to overcome.


With Watson now in to the end, it was simply a case of keeping the #159 on the tarmac and out of the wall for them to secure a more warranted step on the Silver Cup podium as all around kept one eye on the race clock and the other on the sky.

Finally came the chequered flag before Mother Nature had time to throw any real volumes of precipitation at the circuit and confirmed the Garage 59 #159 crew as the winners of the final step to the Silver Cup podium. The #76 R-Motorsport car would ultimately finish in P16.


***Official race result has actually positioned the #159 crew in P2 in Silver Cup with the #46 Black Falcon Mercedes AMG behind then in P3 at the flag rather than the other way around as is reported.

***UPDATE - Garage 59 have confirmed that #46 Black Falcon was given a post race penalty for reasons as yet unknown that swapped the finishing positions of both the #46 and #159 cars


Second or third, this is still a great result for both Garage 59 and Aston Martin Racing as a whole. AMR and their Partner teams in the USA suffered heartache at the opening round of the IMSA Weathertech Sportscar Championship after both Vantage GTD's crashed out early on but drivers Andrew Watson and Roman de Angelis (both at the Rolex 24 last weekend) should great resolve and determination to themselves and GT3 rookie Oliver Hart through to a podium finish of perhaps the toughest 12 hour race about.

Next stop for the Intercontinental GT Challenge is at the Spa 24 in July.

Congratulations to Bentley on their overall race win after years of torment and despair!! 👍

Photo credits - AMR / Garage 59 / IGTC

Pre-dawn Sunday morning saw the start of the 2020 Liqui-Moly Bathurst 12hrs and the opening round of the SRO sanctioned Intercontinental GT Challenge from Mount Panorama just outside of Sydney, Australia.

Limited to just thirty four of the original thirty nine car entry that arrived at the circuit earlier in the week, R-Motorsport had already lost their #62 Pro car entry of Marvin Kirchhofer, Luca Ghiotto and Ollie Caldwell after Kirchhofer suffered a terrifying accident in Qualifying that all but destroyed his Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT3.


That left the Swiss based team with just their high profile BP Castrol sponsored #76 car entry of Rick Kelly, Scott Dixon and Jake Dennis whereas fellow AMR runners Garage 59 still had their #188 Pro-Am and #159 Silver Cup entries.

Starting at 05:45 this morning, the opening laps were very controlled compared with previous years with no accidents reported although the #76 R-Motorsport car did mysteriously plunged from its P10 starting position to near last on the opening lap only for the team to later confirm that an electrical issue between the steering wheel and fuel systems had forced the starting Kelly to restart the system before continuing.


For Garage 59, Come Ledogar would start the #188 car from P18 on grid (P3 in class) whilst Andrew Watson would be starting their new Silver Cup #159 entry from P20 on the grid (P2 in class).

All would run systematically for these two cars throughout the first hour of racing and despite losing three places on grid each during those opening laps. Just after the hour mark both Garage 59 cars would pit a lap or so apart, refuel but retain the same tyres and double stint both Ledogar and Watson.


Disaster would strike the #188 car however just fifteen minutes after pitting when an incorrect line through the Spares Box Dipper ran Ledogar's car over the high kerbs, into a slow spin and heavily into the outside concrete wall. With no 'give' in the wall, the only pieces to flex and break was the #188 Aston Martin - ripping off most component parts on the right hand side of the car.

Calling out the Safety Car for the first time it was great to see the Frenchman remove himself unaided and apparently uninjured from the wreck of his car but for him and co drivers Alex West, Chris Goodwin and Maxime Martin, they would play no further part in the race.


Losing only ten minutes to that Safety Car period, it wasn't too long before another incident took place over the Mountain, this time a Lamborghini making heavy contact with the concrete wall - destroying his driver side also putting them into immediate retirement. Then, and just ten minutes after that another Safety Car for another terrifying high speed accident at McPhillamy Park for the #22 Audi of V8 Supercars hero Garth Tander.

Another accident - another destroyed racing car!


Whilst all of this was going on, the remaining #76 R-Motorsport and #159 Garage 59 cars were methodically consolidating their position on track with Watson eventually pitting from the class lead to hard over to fellow Bathurst debutant Oliver Hart and with Dixon now just outside the top ten again.

Hart would follow in the steps so far made by both AMR teams by double stinting both the drivers and tyres as long as cockpit and track temperature allowed.

Trouble would come back to haunt the R-Motorsport team less than halfway into Jake Dennis' opening stint as he unexpectedly returned to the pit lane and into the garage to replace the cars front splitter and brakes for a reason - had he been off track and suffered damage we can only summise.


As the race approaches its halfway stage, both remaining Aston Martins are still running - the #159 Garage 59 with Canadian Roman De Angelis now aboard for his first laps of the Australian circuit, presently holding P18 overall and P3 in Class. The #76 Castrol liveried R-Motorsport car has also returned to the track but is now six laps down to the leaders.

Hopefully, the second half will be better - it will certainly be even more exciting if this expected rainfall actually arrives and delivers!!

Photo credits - IGTC

As eastern Australia prepares to wake itself for a second day at Mount Panorama and the opening round of the 2020 Intercontinental GT Challenge Series from Bathurst, just one more Free Practice session lays ahead of the now thirty eight car entry before Qualifying starts later Saturday afternoon and the the Top 10 Shoot out later into the evening.

Four Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT3's with thirteen drivers split between the R-Motorsport and Garage 59 teams, they spent all of yesterday preparing their cars and themselves for the tasks ahead around what is one of the most picturesque yet equally demanding circuits anywhere in the world - certainly one of best according to Garage 59's Alex West.


Four sessions where available yesterday amounting to 3hrs 20mins of available track time though some time was lost due to the recovery of cars 'taking themselves out' over the the top of the mountain whilst others, like the #62 R-Motorsport car suffered from prolonged technical issues that saw the Ollie Caldwell/Luca Ghiotto/Marvin Kirchhofer car run no competitive laps over the opening two sessions.

Thankfully, their ailments were soon resolved to let their two debutants get their first taste of the Bathurst circuit after which saw most of the AMR drivers enter times within the top half of the collective timing screen over the remaining sessions.


Last years R-Motorsport sensation Jake Dennis ended the day being the quickest AMR driver in P12 overall with a lap time of 2:05:5601 with Garage 59's silver rated driver Andrew Watson next up in his #159 car with a lap time of 2:06:7143 but all of these times are still over four seconds slower than last years pole setting time - so there is still a long way to go.

Being a twelve hour endurance race some would question the worthiness of a decent qualifying position towards the front of the grid but we must remember that the race starts in total darkness and along a totally unlit circuit. Most incidences tend to happen at the start whilst cars are at their closest, tyres at their coldest and the track its greenest (on race day at least).


Then we have heard talk of substantial rain being forecasted for race day (bizarre as that may sound for an area blighted with severe drought and wild fires and on a circuit that has also recently been resurfaced with little subsequent rainfall to follow to wash away all those slippery oils from the tarmac surface!

At least there will now be live TV streaming (free outside of Australia we believe) for all Qualifying sessions on Saturday and the race in full on Sunday.

Photo credits - Bathurst 12hr

At the time of posting this piece, only a couple of hours (Australian time) remains before the first track session of the Bathurst 12hrs and the first round of the SRO Intercontinental GT Challenge from Mount Panorama in the east of Australia.

Over the course of Thursday, the thirty nine cars spread across GT3, GT4 and Invitational classes took their now customary leisurely drive down from the circuit to the town of Bathurst to meet the locals and the many thousands of converging race fans ahead of the more formal track activities that lead into the start of the race proper on Sunday morning.


Four new turbo charged Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT3's grace the grid this year having not been able to compete at last years event due to the ruleset demanding only race cars with homologation papers at least a year old and as the new Vantage platform wasn't formally homologated under March 2019, that meant that R-Motorsport had to make do with the older, normally aspirated version. Of course by saying 'making do' means that they still damn near won the race overall had it not been for a pesky Porsche!!!

This year, Swiss based R-Motorsport bring two such machines to Australia this year for a full two car attack on Class A Pro for drivers Jake Dennis, Scott Dixon and Rick Kelly aboard their #76 car and Marvin Kirchhofer, Oliver Caldwell and Luca Ghiotto aboard the #62 car. Dixon and Kelly both need no introduction as multiple Indycar and V8 Supercar race and Championship winners respectively whilst Ghiotto and Caldwell have their first real GT3 experience around one of the toughest permanent public road circuits about.


Garage 59 also commit to the series as a full season entry as well as with two of their AMR Vantage GT3's for this event. As published only a day or so ago, team co-owner Alex West described his race intentions to us by confirming just why they had employed the driving talents of AMR WEC driver Maxime Martin alongside their existing three driver line up of them plus Chris Goodwin and Come Ledogar as they look to take the Class A Pro-Am race win by storm. They will be complemented by their Class A Silver #159 car of Andrew Watson, Roman de Angelis and Oliver Hart who all (along with Martin from the #188 car) debut at the circuit this weekend. Obviously, both Watson and de Angelis will be hoping of something better after their respective AMR Vantage GTD's suffered early race ending damage at last weekends Rolex 24.


Four Free Practice sessions lay ahead of the teams today (Friday) before a fifth session on Saturday morning ahead of Qualifying and the Top 10 shootout later in the afternoon. Race itself starts very early at 05:45hrs local (GMT + 11hours).

We were originally hoping for five such beasts as the IGTC grid is this weekend being supported with cars from the Australian GT Endurance Championship - looks like we will have to wait a few more weeks for the Australian GT debut of the Tony Quinn Vantage GT3!

Cant wait............!!!

Photo credits - IGTC / Castrol

With two Aston Martin Racing Partner teams entering two V8 Vantage GT3's apiece into the 2020 Bathurst 12Hr, today sees another drive line up confirmed leaving just one outstanding ahead of the event that starts at the end of the month.

Following on from their announcement late last year from Swiss based R-Motorsport running a top level all Pro line up in the #76 car, today sees the team announce another trio of drivers (also entered into the full Pro class) but this time made of a trio with mixed racing experience.


Long time team racer Marvin Kirchhofer this year joins up with the first new recruit signed by the team for their 2020 campaigns in Luca Ghiotto who will in turn be joined by GT3 debutant yet already a single seater and GT4 Champion Ollie Caldwell.

Italian racer Ghiotto has spent the majority of his racing career to date in single seaters with the last three seasons racing in the FIA F2 Championship. This season he has also raced with Ginetta LNT in the World Endurance Championship in their LMP1.

Caldwell meanwhile has been completing most of his racing calendar last year abroad in the Formula Regional European Championship, at the Macau Grand Prix in an FIA F3 car as well as the German ADAC F4 Series - all from which he earned himself as a top ten finalist in the 2019 Aston Martin Autosport Young Driver of the Year.

In 2018 he also secured the overall GT4 class win in the Gulf 12hr in a Mercedes with Ram Racing's Ian Loggie.

This will be Caldwell's first visit to the Mountain and his first GT3 race, similar to how it was with Matt Parry last year with the team when the (birthday boy today) raced in the teams #760 normally aspirated Vantage GT3 with the two team Principles for the first time. Parry also served as Caldwell's personal driver coach during his 2019 season.


This trio lines up alongside Jake Dennis, Scott Dixon and Rick Kelly who have already been confirmed by the team within their #76 car, a car that will this time run in a Castrol Oil livery. Despite the depth and quality of these names, this will also be the first time that multiple Indycar Champion Dixon has ever raced at the circuit whereas former V8 Supercar racer Kelly obviously has many times and with Dennis who was part of the trio that finished a very close second at last years event.


These two cars are of course joined by two from the Garage 59 stable with team co-owners Alex West and Chris Goodwin again partnering up with their resident Pro driver Come Ledogar in their #188 Pro-Am entry.

They will be joined by the as yet unconfirmed trio of Silver ranked drivers aboard their second car.


The 2020 12hrs of Bathurst also starts off the 2020 Intercontinental GT Challenge - a five race series which will also take most of these GT3 runners to Spa Francorchamps, Suzuka, Indianapolis before concluding again in Kyalami, South Africa.

Track action for the Bathurst 12Hr runners begins with the first Free Practice session on Friday 31t January.

Photo credits - IGTC / R-Motorsport / Garage 59

Last weekends final round of the Intercontinental GT Challenge from the rejuvenated Kyalami race track in South Africa was very much a breath of fresh air in the world of motorsport with all too many events these days taking place at sterile, more heartless and lack lustre venues.

Obviously, the Kyalami of today differs greatly to that of the seventies when Formula 1 commanded and got the admiration of the world at large that it deserved back then even though there were all too many darkened days amongst them. Last weekends event however, was conducted in more notably enjoyable surroundings as the international racing community finally accepted this iconic name back into its fold with local fans in their thousands coming out to catch up on what they had so far been missing.


Whoever devised the day into night Free Practice and the similar nine hour race format was a stroke of genius as having the best the GT3 racing world could offer, all competing on a track brand new to most together with the unpredictable sub-tropical weather that the southern tip of Africa can come up with made the event what is was despite results not going the way of the Aston Martin Racing runners.

Having already contended with some truly remarkable weather patterns moving in across the circuit during the course of Free Practice and Qualifying, the start of the race on Saturday at least started under clear blue skies and increasing track and cockpit temperatures as the twenty eight starters got under way.


For the #188 Garage 59 Pro-Am entry, the race sadly never really got underway as an uncharacteristic gearbox failure aboard their AMR V8 Vantage GT3 sluiced oil onto the rear wheels of the car, putting starting driver Chris Goodwin into a half spin and through the gravel trap before making heavy contact with a sausage kerb with the front end as he began the recovery process to the pits. That was only his third lap!!

That combination of damage at either end of the car would consign them to the garage for the next two hours of the race - effectively ending their podium bid unless they could later complete 70% of the race winners distance. Co-drivers Alex West and Come Ledogar would have to sit patiently for their turn.


Garage 59's misfortunes meanwhile left the reigns of the AMR brand firmly in the hands of the two R-Motorsport GT3's with them having started from a post Qualifying penalised P12 (#76) and P19 (#62) for their starting drivers of Maxime Martin and Hugo de Sadeleer respectively.

Despite both cars competing in the full Pro class, each car carried a non full Pro driver in the form of World Challenge Europe Silver Cup winner De Sadeleer in the #62 and single seater racer but GT rookie Enaam Ahmed in the other. Their performance on track however far from compromised the cars overall performance as the #62 raised itself as high as P2 overall just after the halfway mark with the #76 hovering around P17.


Just as the light began to fade, incidences began to happen on track and the threat of rain before the end of the race began to hold some real likelihood. A huge tyre blowout on the #108 Bentley threw up the need for another FCY following on from one earlier to recover a stricken Lamborghini from the local trio within the National Cup class in what had been a reasonably clean race so far. By then the Garage 59 crew had already worked their wonder on the #188 car with Goodwin already having completed his 'opening stint' before handing over to Alex West for his first laps in the race.

With the clock counting down to just three hours remaining, the #62 car still looked a menacing threat to the leading Porsches as the grey and blue liveried car circulated just 40 seconds back from the leader in P6 having themselves lost track time for an earlier drive through penalty for track limits.

Then everything got turned upon its heads!!


The #108 Bentley that earlier suffered a massive blowout suffered a more significant dilemma as it nosedived heavily into the tyre wall - another FCY was needed to recover it and repair the barrier damage just as the rain began to fall. Not slowly and progressively like we maybe more used to in Europe but with an off to on effect, quickly swamping the track with rivers of water for it to suddenly stop as quick as it had started.

Twenty five minutes behind the Safety Car later and it wasn't looking good for a restart anytime soon as the rain came and went only to return again as progressively longer and intense downpours. This, together with the poor weather forecast for the remaining two hours proved to be the end of the race for the #188 Garage 59 car as it was returned to the garage - not with any technical issue other than not being able to make up its minimum race time to be able to be classified by the chequered flag. They would finish their IGTC finale some 50 laps + short.


For the best part of the next ninety minutes, the remaining field tried to tippy toe around the 5.45km circuit as the thunder, lightning and rain continued to hammer down around the circuit as rivers of flood water washed over the circuit. At times it appeared impossible to simply drive around the circuit at the slowest of speeds yet alone race at any significant speed.
With neither team in any Championship position at this season finale in South Africa anyway, attention has already turned to the 2020 season of the Intercontinental GT Challenge that starts in little over sixty days at the 12hours of Bathurst in Australia at the end of January.

This is where the new AMR Vantage GT3 finally make its full debut in Australia having missed out on homologation rules at this years event.

Whats there not to like about this series?

Photo credits - Garage 59 / R-Motorsport / IGTC

Never having really gone away, it has been a lot of years since we have seen any mainstream international motor racing being beamed around the world onto our TV sets from the historical 4.5km circuit in Kyalami, South Africa.

Whilst hosting the Formula 1 circus for many years in the seventies, it racing history has been  colourful and diverse yet with dark overtones unfortunately taking the limelight from what was always a challenging circuit so it is always good to see new, brighter history being written at this circuit after too many years in the doldrums.

This weekend sees the Intercontinental GT Challenge host its final round of the 2019 season at the now revamped circuit with three Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT3's from two AMR Partner teams taking part in the form of both Garage 59 and R Motorsport for the final nine hours of racing.


From the first track action of yesterday through to the Top 10 shoot out of this afternoon, all three AMR cars have been showing their worth through some truly mesmerising weather conditions around what is an circuit.

The first Practice session of yesterday was conducted from under an incredible sunset, one that would go head to head with the likes of Bathurst and into full darkness with both Pro class R-Motorsport cars figuring prominently with their mixed driver line ups to what we have been previously used to.

The the #76 car, Maxime Martin would be again joined by Jake Dennis but also with the GT debuting Aston Martin Autosport BRDC Young Driver of the Year finalist's Enaan Ahmed. Their sister #62 would be made up of Marvin Kirchhofer, Ricky Collard and Hugo de Sadeleer - all well known within the team from the teams respective Blancpain GT Series activities of this year.


Joining these and still relatively 'fresh' from the podium finish in the last round of the Challenge series in Suzuka are the #188 Pro-Am Garage 59 crew of Alex West, Chris Goodwin and Come Ledogar.

The grid would be made up of twenty eight cars, most will be competing within the full Pro Class with three Silver, two Pro-Am, three Am class and two national entries including the likes of Charlenes Arangies who previously raced a V12 Vantage GT3 in the National GT arena with great success it must be added.

Moving into the three Qualifying sessions of this afternoon, each driver would have fifteen minutes to post their best time before all three driver times would be totalled and averaged out to determine which top ten cars would go into todays later Top 10 Shoot Out to determine the formation of the start of the grid.


Q1 started on a dry, warm track but had an obviously storm front moving towards the circuit with the forecast of more torrential rain with thunder and lightning probably.

West, Collard and Martin were all out first with the two R-Motorsport cars conducting only a series of installation laps in the first instance whilst West quickly got down to business with half the allotted time gone before either the #62 or #76 had actually set any lap time. Then out of the blue, Martin set the fastest lap of the weekend so far to claim provisional pole by over 0.1 of a second to the then pace setting Honda NSX. Collard would also set a decent lap time to finish in P12 but he would be pinged from track limits, losing his time on that lap to drop down to P26. West would eventually finish P22.

Next up in Q2 and with the rain getting ever closer and lightning now striking the ground in the suburbs around the track were Goodwin, de Sadeleer and Ahmed. Lap times were only showing their own lap times and their accumulative times rather than their times relative to one another in Q2.


On the timing board, all three cars were running in close formation to one another but as the rain began an error from Goodwin caused the rear of his #188 car to come around through the Esses and spin around to become beached on the fringe of the gravel trap forcing the session to be red flagged.

With just a few minutes lost to aid the recovery of the stricken AMR, cars in pit lane were all keen to get going before the rains really arrived - too keen for the #76 car in fact as Ahmed stuck the nose of his car out into the fast lane only for it to be clipped by a passing Audi. That error would ultimately cost them more track position at the end of the session after their unsafe release penalty was applied.

By now the wind and rain had really arrived on track with rain pouring down onto a circuit for of cars on slick tyres and wind ripping off the advertising hoardings as the wind speed hit gusts of nearly 50mph!!!


As a result of that, Q3 would be declared a wet session with headlights and high intensity rear lights all on but not all cars on wets. That quickly became apparent as Nick Tandy understeered his Porsche into the tyre wall to prompt another red flag which at least the remaining drivers to come to their senses to fit wet tyres during the short break.

Now more appropriately attired, it didn't take Dennis too much longer to get going as he battled with two Porsches for the honours of the top three positions - stealing P2 for a time before a last lap lunge from one of them dropped the #76 back down to P3. Still, that was a Top 10 Shoot Out place.

For both Kirchhofer and Ledogar, Q3 wasn't particularly productive for them (for unknown reasons) that left the #62 back towards the rear of the Pro class in P19 and the #188 the fourth placed non Pro car in P22. The #76 would go into the later Top 10 Shoot out for Dennis to finish in P7, 1.117 seconds off the lead pace but a further grid penalty would see that car drop to P12 for tomorrow's race.


Of course, being a nine hour race Qualifying doesn't really mean a lot as it is usually where you finish at the fall of the chequered flag that counts rather than from where you start. The start of the Kyalami 9Hr begins at 13:00hrs (local)

Good luck to you all!

Photo credits - R-Motorsport / Garage 59 / IGTC

The fifth and final round of the 2019 Intercontinental GT Challenge takes place this weekend from the Kyalami race track in South Africa with three examples of the new Aston Martin Racing V98 Vantage GT3 making their way down for Sunday's nine hour spectatcular.

The #188 Garage 59 Pro-Am entry of Alex West, Chris Goodwin and Come Ledogar make their way southwards for this weekend event having worked hard to recover their racing situation by the end of the last round at Suzuka where weather conditions had heavily impacted upon the grids preparations to finally claim a P2 finish in class by the close of that events ten hours of racing.


Joining them at the season's finale are also two examples from Swiss based R-Motorsport fleet featuring AMR's with three of the teams mainstream Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup drivers teaming up with two lesser experienced GT drivers and well as a GT debutant.

Having raced together in the Blancpain GT World Challenge Europe Series sees Marvin Kirchhofer reunite with Ricky Collard in the #62 car and they are joined this time by fellow team World Challenge racer and Silver Cup runner up Hugo de Sadeleer.


In the sister #76 car, drivers Maxime Martin and Jake Dennis are joined by Aston Martin Autosport BRDC Young Driver of the Year nominee and F3 racer Enaam Ahmed for what is thought to be his first racing experience within a top flight GT car following his appraisal laps for the BRDC Award around Silverstone in one of Garage 59's AMR Vantage GT3's last month.


Track action starts this Thursday with up to four hours of Private testing ahead of a further ninety minutes of night testing to see out the day. Friday sees both Pre Qualifying and Qualifying ahead of of the rolling start for the 9 hour race beginning at 13:00hrs local.

Qualifying and the race itself will all be streamed live via the IGTC social media channels.

Photo credits - Blancpain / Garage 59 / R-Motorsport