A more sedate race programme to look forward to this weekend
A much quieter race weekend coming up with what would be taking our fancy with just three main series featuring a sole Aston Martin Racing powered Vantage GT3 or GT4 within their midst.
Starting with the farthest away from us will see a sole AMR Vantage GT3 takes its place within a fourteen-car line up for this weekends fourth round of the GT World Challenge Australia as the #1 Volante Rosso car this time features a revised driver line up for their visit to Sandown Park.
Joining the Pro side of the previous line up in Liam Talbot will be the young British racer Jamie Day who now apparently replaces Declan Fraser for the remainder of the season after his best finish to his GT3 based GT World Challenge Europe season last weekend with a double podium visit and class win (alongside Kobe Pauwels) in the Sprint Cup Series.
The reason for the swap is unclear with the series itself referring it as a ‘withdrawal’ of Fraser from the crew after their good start top the season from Phillip Island has somewhat waned over recent rounds. Day, of course, featured within the teams 12Hrs of Bathurst GT3 entry alongside Mateo Villagomez and Jaylyn Robotham earlier in the year as well as another entry into the series last season that failed to materialise on race day thanks to ongoing technical issues that rounded off that season’s efforts.
They will run their usual two race format.
Next there is the fifth round of the Super Taikyu Series from Autopolis in Japan where the #777 D’Station Racing AMR Vantage GT3 crew of Satoshi Hoshino, Yuta Kamimura and Tomonobu Fujii again take the wheel of their ST-X entry.
Last time out at Sugo at the start of the month saw a near lights to flag race win for the trio and all will be hoping for more this time around after that result lifted the team up to fourth in the overall Championship with these three rounds remaining.
This will be another five-hour race starting at 11:00hrs local.
Then finally, we also have the ESET Cup or GT Cup Series as its now referred to as and their fifth round of an eight-round season with their latest collection of sprint and endurance races from Most in the Czech Republic.
Last time out in the series should have been from Poznan but that was cancelled at the eleventh hour by the series although we did learn that the team did still compete at an event of some description from the venue.
Photo credits – Teams / Series / social media
Two GT Cup series get back to business at both the Solvakia Ring and at Snetterton
For the European based series, this will be their second round of the season which will again see the Czech based Janik Motorsport Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT4 Evo within their expected fourteen strong multi-class entry for what is listed as a three-hour round.
Saying that, the #73 Vaclav Janik/Petr Koukola driven car is listed as just racing within a one-hour endurance alongside another three of those fourteen GT3/GT4/GTX/TC entries. The opening round of the season from the Red Bull Ring brought the team class podium finishes by the end of the second sprint and final endurance races.
Then back in Norfolk, the UK based GT Cup Champiosnhip will be running their third round of the season after opening trips to both Donington Park and Brands Hatch where this weekend’s entry list sees three Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT4’s do battle again amongst their expected entry of twenty-three cars.
The dominant #82 Feathers Motorsport duo of Archie Clark and Tom Canning will be looking to further secure their overall Championship lead after class podium winning successes at both opening rounds.
This race weekend will be made up of two sets of Qualifying, a 25-minute sprint race and a 50-minute pit stop race across both Saturday and Sunday.
Photo credits – Teams / Series / social media
Debut podium success for the Janik Motorsport AMR team in the GT Cup Series this weekend
It was a rather successful start to this Aston Martin Racing powered campaign this season for the Czech based Janik Motorsport team as they competed at their first round of the GT Cup Series (ESET Cup Series) from the Red Bull Ring with their Vantage GT4 Evo.Another series that permits multiple class of GT cars as well as single seaters within other races, the GT Cup Series started in Austria with a pair of twenty-five-minute sprint races followed by an hour-long endurance race for their twenty-six-car entry.
Czech drivers Petr Koukola and Vaclav Yanik got their AMR racing account off to a flying start within Saturday’s opening endurance round within they finished P18 overall and P2 in class.
That success was then continued into Sunday where Koukola ran solo within the two sprint races to finish P4 in class after the first and with another visit to the podium of his own with a P18 overall/P3 in class finish after race 2.
The series now moves onto the Slovakia Ring in early June.
Photo credits – Team / Series / social media
Janík Motorsport debuting their new AMR Vantage in the GT Cup Series in Austria this weekend
Another of Aston Martin Racing’s new Vantage GT4 Evo’s will make its racing debut this weekend within the renames GT Cup Series (nee ESET Cup Series) starting at the Red Bull Ring for the Czech based Janik Motorsport team.
It’s been a long time since their mid-February launch when the unveiled their latest GT weapon of choice and we final have some more detail as to who and where they will be racing it.
Starting a seven round season this weekend, the #73 Janik Motorsport ACCR Czech Team entry for Jan Matyas and Vaclav Janik will be competing within both the Sprint and Endurance rounds within a sizeable grid of over twenty cars within each race format over the weekend.
Friday track action will be limited to testing before moving into Free Practice and Qualifying on Saturday morning before the hour-long endurance round later in the day before two twenty-five-minute sprint races either side of lunch on Sunday.
Photo credits - Team
Czech team reveals new Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT4 Evo for ESET Cup Series
Sadly not knowing much about either team nor series, it was appear that the team is led by Vaclav Janik who will primarily race the car within the ESET Series eight venue season that starts at the Red Bull Ring in mid-May before including the likes of the Slovakia Ring, Lausitzring, Brno before concluding at Balaton Park in Hungary in late September.
During today’s reveal, the team also hinted at possible entries within the German ADAC GT4 Germany Series. Hopefully we will find out more about these guys as the season moves on.
Photo credits – Team / social media
