Five Aston Martin GTEs confirmed for Le Mans with still two in reserve (UPDATED)
Three Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE powered teams were already taken as a given considering their full season entry within season 11 of the World Endurance Championship with the fourth automatic entry coming from the Danish GMB Motorsport team for their class win last year within the Le Mans Cup Series.
Defending WEC GTE Am Class winner TF Sport get another automatic entry which has gone to their all French European Le Mans AMR Vantage GTE entry of Valentin Hasse-Clot and brothers Arnold and Maxime Robin for the fifth confirmed entry.
That has meant that TF Sport’s gentleman driver John Hartshorne has again missed out despite his continued participation within both the Asian Le Mans Series and European Le Mans Series, but they do claim a place within the ten strong, multi-class reserve list in eight, two places above another speculative entry request from the American Heart of Racing team in tenth.
Just a couple of queries arising from today’s announcement in that the #25 ORT by TF Sport has just Ahmad Al Harthy listed aboard that car when their WEC entry line up has already been announced with Charlie Eastwood and Michael Dinan as well as the #777 D’Station Racing car lists Charlie Fagg with both Satoshi Hoshino and Tomonobu Fujii instead of the WEC third driver of Casper Stevenson. All other driver line ups (as far as we know) remain constant across both the WEC and LM24 entries.
Photo credits – Teams
This weekend's weekly round up of AMR runners around the world
Starting in Japan, the D’Station Racing team raced out their penultimate round of the Super Taikyu Series from Okayama and came away with a P3 finish overall and within their ST-X class for their AMR Vantage GT3 crew of Satoshi Hoshino, Tomonobu Fujii and Tsubasa Kondo after technical issues with the car lost them ground during that three-hour race. The teams ST-1 class Championship contending Vantage GT8R did not race at this event due to their class not being scheduled to complete although both cars are expected back for the season finale at Suzuka in late November.
The European Le Man Series and Le Mans Cup Series both raced out their final races of the season down in Portimao in Portugal with the AMR marque again being represented by both the Oman Racing with TF Sport Vantage GTE’s and the Bullitt Racing AMR Vantage GT3.
For the Spanish based Bullitt Racing team, their pain had already been suffered at the previous round at Spa when a pre-race incident for Stephen Pattrick lead to the #99 car that he shares with Valentin Hasse-Clot not being able to start and therefore lost all possibility of maintaining a class Championship charge at this final round.
With winter plans from the team still to be confirmed, a spin for Pattrick during Qualifying meant that they had to start the race from the very rear but a good recovery after the earlier red flag for an accident on the pit straight following an earlier Safety Car had put them at the front of the class, before the Frenchman’s final pass for the lead was over aggressive for which he was to serve a drive through penalty for avoidable contact.
They were to finish the race in fourth as Pattrick would within the GT3 Drivers Championship.
The two Oman Racing cars within the ELMS would be hoping for a better end to their topsy-turvey season after having already lost out on any further championship contention at the previous round at Spa as well.
Things were looking good for a time as the #69 of Ahmad Al Harthy / Sam de Haan / Marco Sorenson had Qualified fourth and was running line astern with their sister #95 car of John Hartshorne / Jonny Adam / Henrique Chaves until the dying moments of the race.
Whilst the #69 did succeed in claiming another podium finish to their year, the #95 car was involved in an unfortunate incident with an LMP3 car whilst being overtaken by an LMP2 car which lead to contact between the Aston and the LMP3 car to end each of their races within the gravel/barrier.
In the final races of the French FFSA GT4 Series from Paul Ricard, it was a great finale from the #74 Racing Spirit of Lemans AMR Vantage GT4 of Romain Carton and Victor Weyrich who took a pole position start in Saturday’s night race to a P2 finish before claiming a further P2 finish in Sundays final race of the season.
Whilst their sister #92 car of Ronald Basso and Sandro Perissouthi also claimed a class P2 finish on Saturday, the only championship contending crew – that of the #72 GPA Racing AMR of Kevin Jimenez and Florent Grizaud sadly failed in their quest to win the Am Class after only finishing in second in race 1 behind the then crowned class winning Audi (sounds familiar?)
That leaves just the GT Open and GT Open Cup Series that concluded at the Circuit de Catalunya with the Belgian Street Art Racing team fielding their Vantage GT3 and GT4 cars.
With neither being in any Championship contention, the #007 GT3 of Pascal Bachmann narrowly missed a second-class podium of the year, finishing P4 at the end of race 1 before ending the final race of his debut GT3 season in sixth.
The team’s GT4 crew of Julien Darras and Jahid Fazal Karim came back from their bruising round last time out at Monza to see out Karim’s first step up to GT4 racing with a P4 and then a podium P3 class finish to see out their year.
Sadly no Championship hopes for the three Aston Martin crews at LMC and ELMS finale from Portimao this weekend
In scarily quick succession to one another, this weekend sees a further two GT race series conclude as both the ACO rules Le Mans Cup and European Le Mans Series come to an end after their sixth and final round of the season at the Autodromo Internacional do Algarve in Portimao, Portugal.
With the Bullitt Racing Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT3 again being listed within the LMC entry as well as the two TF Sport prepared AMR Vantage GTE cars of the Oman Racing team within the ELMS grid, this weekend sees the unfortunate fact that none of these cars will be in championship contention for either series after their respective results at the last round of each Series at Spa Francorchamps saw them fall short of what was needed to continue that campaign.
For the #99 Bullitt Racing AMR of Stephen Pattrick and Valentin Hasse-Clot, their GT3 Drivers Championship possibilities ended in the barriers around a wet Spa track on the way to the grid as Pattrick (unseen by TV) spun and rear ended his car into the barrier, breaking its rear suspension even before the race had begun.
In a season fresh to the AMR Vantage and having co-shared with drivers Hasse-Clot and Theo Nouet throughout the year, the black and red car was in a good position to take the series to this final round in Portugal against the #55 GMB Motorsport Honda NSX of Kasper Jenson and former WEC AMR GTE Am Champion Kristian Poulson, but the incident in Belgium has already handed that accolade to the Danish pairing.
None the less, the Spanish based team will still be looking to finish this AMR debut season for them on something of a high as winter events in the Middle East have already been hinted at by the team and all seat time is good time for their gentleman driver owner Pattrick.
Then there are the two AMR Vantage GTE crews of Ahmad Al Harthy, Sam De Haan and Marco Sorenson with John Hartshorne, Henrique Chaves and Jonny Adam aboard their #69 and #95 Oman Racing cars that compete within the ELMS series.
In the topsy-turvy world of Balance of Performance based multi-class racing, the 2022 season has certainly been a cruel one for the Tom Ferrier lead team as the #69 car was effectively taken out of the opening round at Paul Ricard by an errant LMP3 car, before coming back with a convincing lights to flag win next time out at Imola before being BoP’d right out of the next round at Monza before showing signs of recovery in time for Barcelona (but couldn’t replicate that during the race) before coming back with the best performance they could at Spa albeit it too little too late for the Championship.
It has been a similar tale for their #95 Hartshorne lead car who has scored points at all rounds except for the BoP debacle at Monza to show massive improvement on his part (with the help of both Chaves and Adam of course) as they have already surpassed the total score of his 2021 campaign in the series.
Presently, the #69 crew sit in P6 on 41 points whilst the #95 crew sit in P11 with 36 points against the championship leaders 72 points.
Photo credits – Andrew Lofthouse / David Lord / Teams
A steep hill but still possible for the two Oman Racing Aston Martins to hit the top as the ELMS heads for Spa Francorchamps
With four previous rounds in France, Italy and Spain already under their belts, the two Oman Racing with TF Sport Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE’s crews of Ahmad Al Harthy, Sam De Haan and Marco Sorenson aboard the #69 car and John Hartshorne, Henrique Chaves and Jonny Adam in the #95 car each slipped down the order slightly after a disappointing end to their trip to Barcelona despite the #69 cars earlier class pole position.
Their P10 and P7 finishes in class respectively came off the back of a BoP change for Spain after being ‘taken out of the equation’ at Monza following on from a class double podium for the two cars before that at Imola.
This leaves the two crews three points apart in P6 and P7 in the Driver’s Championship but importantly still in contention with the leading Porsche crew who are firmly due a BoP adjustment of their own after two successive class wins. With a thirty-six points deficit but still fifty-two points available for this round at Spa and the season finale at Portimao in a month’s time – it will still be a steep hill to climb (pardoning the pun for Spa) for either AMR crew to find themselves in contention in Portugal.
Another forty-one-car entry beckons all to the circuit for next weekend’s four-hour race with twelve GTE’s making up for their share of that amongst the other LMP2 and LMP3 machinery.
Track action begins on Thursday with Free Practice before Qualifying on Saturday and the green flag to the race at 11:30 local on Sunday.
Photo credit – Andrew Lofthouse
Errors for the #69 cost them a chance of narrowing the gap at the head of the European Le Mans Series
The midway point of the European Le Mans Series sadly didn’t go the way that the Oman Racing with TF Sport had intended in Barcelona at the weekend despite a strong showing ahead of the race.
Victorious at Imola but effectively balance of performance out of the race next time out at Monza, another revision to the series BoP table appeared to give back much of the power lost from the Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE platform after Imola, with an extra litre of fuel to boot.
Making the most of that situation, Ahmad Al Harty then placed his #69 car that he shares with Sam De Haan and Marco Sorenson at the head of the GTE field whilst the #95 of John Hartshorne, Jonny Adam and Henrique Chaves had to make do at the tail end of the pack.
The adage of Qualifying being one thing and the race always being another certainly came into play at the Circuit de Catalunya as (after the lap 1 Safety Car call for three cars off in the first sequence of corners), the #69 car of Al Harthy was soon passed by first one Porsche and then soon another to find himself down in third by the end of the first half hour of the four-hour race.
Despite an error from Al Harthy accounting for some of the time lost on track, the JMW Ferrari was then also soon hustling the #69 car for position before passing him just two corners before the 488 pushed its luck and spun the #93 Porsche in front of the Omani racer - but at least that lifted them back up to second in class by the end of the first hour.
Being the first of the two TF Sport prepared Aston Martins to pit, Al Harthy would be on for another double stint whilst Hartshorne stayed out for slightly longer before pitting before falling again to close to the rear of the pack.
Trouble was then just literally around the corner for the #69 as contact with the #57 Car Guy Ferrari had the car back on the apron with severe front-end damage. Damaging the bonnet, splitter, wing and undertray, it was a recoverable situation for the team but the repair time would lead to them going three laps down – effectively out of the race and especially so as the car was later awarded a Drive through Penalty for that contact earlier in the race.
For the #95 car, it was for them just a process of pounding in the laps with both Adam and Chaves to the finish and that elevated them to seventh by the chequered flag.
Whilst these results don’t look great for the Oman Racing crews (especially after a double class win for the #77 Proton Competition Porsche) their respective positions in the championship with the number of points remaining does mean that neither crew are not yet out of contention.
With the Series moving to Spa Francorchamps later in September before a season finale at Portimao, the #95 car now leads their stablemates in sixth on thirty-three points and the #69 crew in seventh on thirty points. With the leading #77 car only on sixty-nine points so with twenty-six points being available per round, anything is still possible and especially so if the Porsche is pulled back in its performance window ahead of the powerhouse Spa round!
Photo credit – Andrew Lofthouse
Bullitt Racing join the fifty cars entered into the Road to Le Mans
Bolstered in numbers in both the GT3 and LMP3 classes for this third round of their 2022 season again sees the Spanish based Bullitt Racing team represent the Aston Martin Racing marque at an event previously well served by those in AMR Vantage GT3 cars before.
Last year we saw the Oman Racing with TF Sport AMR of Ahmad Al Harty and Michael Dinan take a podium finish in race 1 with both TF Sport and Beechdean AMR flying the flag in 2019 with TF Sport taking a double class win in 2017 with drivers Al Harthy and Tom Jackson.
This year’s Le Mans Cup Series has also started well for Bullitt Racing with drivers Stephen Pattrick and Theo Nouet just missing out on an AMR powered debut podium finish after a dramatic build up to the opening round at Paul Ricard in April followed by a P2 in class finish for the #99 red and black machine at the last round at Imola in May.
Those rounds have placed the team third in class as the series reaches it middle stages of the season.
For Le Mans, the team reverts to its intended driver line up as young Parisian Valentin Hasse-Clot finally becomes available to pair up with team boss Pattrick for these two races and beyond as his prior engagements within the FFSA GT4 Series prevented his participation at both the Paul Ricard and Imola rounds.
Thirty-six LMP3 cars mix with the thirteen GT3 cars make up the capacity sized grid at Le Mans (ten additional cars to the full season entry) for the two fifty-five-minute races that will take place on the Thursday evening and Saturday morning prior the start of the Le Mans 24Hr itself.
Photo credits - LMC
A domineering display from Oman Racing by TF Sport team at the ELMS return to Imola
The return of the European Le Mans Series to the Autodromo Internazionale Enzo e Dino Ferrari at Imola after a six-year break proved itself something of a rewarding venture for the two Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTEs of Oman Racing with TF Sport earlier today.
Having had their #69 car of Sam De Haan, Ahmad Al Harthy and Marco Sorenson eliminated from the first round at the end of just the opening lap at Paul Ricard, the Omani bannered crew (and indeed Omani driver) of Al Harthy went onto prove a point at this weekend’s second round of the season by claiming his first ever GTE pole position yesterday ahead of a near lights to flag class win in today’s four-hour race.
Al Harthy drove a dominant two-hour opening stint within the #69 car where he maintained the class lead from his eleven other competitors despite all the distractions that the multiple Safety Car and Full Course Yellow periods of caution could throw at him in addition to the sometimes-close attention of the Iron Dames Ferrari.
John Hartshorne would also continue to enjoy a resurgence of his topflight GT driving ability as he progressed his #95 car up from its P11 starting place to hand the car over to Jonny Adam from an incredible fifth in class as nearly a third of the GTE hit problems early on.
With the order of driver sequence running as they were between the two TF Sport prepared cars, it was the unenviable position for De Haan to finally get in more than half a lap of ACO rules racing this time to race and maintain a diminishing gap to Adam who was already by now up to speed and catching the #69.
No wanting to prolong the inevitable (and maybe with a bit of insider information) De Haan let Adam go through to take the GTE class lead for only about two or three laps before the #95 had to pit again themselves for fuel and another driver change.
Forty-five minutes in the car for De Haan later and former WEC GTE Pro Champion Marco Sorenson finally got his first drive of the 2022 ELMS season, taking charge during one of the (too many) FCY and Safety Car periods for cars colliding and/or running off track with just under an hour to go.
With Chaves already aboard the #95 Aston in a ‘comfortable’ second place, the #69 crew knew that the #95 car would have to pit again for a splash of fuel and then, it was also unlikely that a silver ranked driver like Chaves could ever eat into a 48 second plus gap being maintained by a platinum driver like Sorenson so protecting the work first put in by Al Harthy was all that the Dane had to do!
Despite FCY’s to the end, Imola transpired to be a magical return to the Imola circuit for the ELMS and Oman Racing with TF Sport as Tom Ferrier’s team confirmed a domineering P1 and P2 lockout of the GTE podium by the fall of the chequered flag and confirmed that result into the annuals of the series for the first Omani team/driver class win.
These podium finishes compliment that podium from the Bullitt Racing team and their AMR Vantage GT3 in yesterday’s Le Mans Cup at the circuit
With the 24 Hours of Le Mans now taking the attention of ACO rules racing next month, the next round of the ELMS will be at Monza at the start of July.
Photo credits – Andrew Lofthouse
Two Vantage GTEs and a Vantage GT3 visit Imola for the next round of ACO rules racing
Having kicked things off at Paul Ricard this time last month, it was a corresponding sides of the racing coin for the two Oman Racing with TF Sport entered Aston Martin Racing Vantage GTE’s as one exited stage right on the very first lap whilst the other returned the best result for their gentleman driver so far since his return to topflight GT racing.
For the #69 car of Ahmad Al Harthy, Sam De Haan and Marco Sorenson, their quick fire out of the box gave them a P2 start for that opening race but sadly their hard work was quickly undone after a rash move from an LMP3 car avoiding another LMP3 car led to front end contact for the black and silver livered Aston Martin and broken steering just after the pit lane exit on the opening lap.
In contrast, the #95 car of John Hartshorne, Jonny Adam and Henrique Chaves progressed their red machine up from a P12 start out of twelve GTEs to finish the four hours of Paul Ricard sixth in class.
Forty-two cars are listed for the 4H of Imola with twelve GTE cars again taking to the grid around the 4.9km circuit on Sunday.
Free Practice 1 and a Bronze driver test will take place Friday with a further Free Practice and Qualifying on Saturday ready for a green flag at 11:30hrs local on Sunday.
Joining them in Italy will be the Spanish based Bullitt Racing team who compete within the ELMS supporting Michelin Le Mans Cup Series with their black and red Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT3.
Also having auditioned in the series with their Aston Martin at Paul Ricard last month, the #99 was unlucky not to have overcome significant frontal damage after an incident during Free Practice to come back with a podium finish within the GT3 class by the end of their 110-minute race.
Generous inter AMR team support from the PROsport Racing team in Germany furnished the team with the necessary spares to allow team boss Stephen Pattrick and Theo Nouet to compete in the race that eventually saw a mix up in timing to have us believe that a last lap pass from the young Frenchman was enough for them to steal P3 at the death. Only later was it confirmed that the race had finished the lap before and that the #99 car had missed out on P3 by just 0.3 of a second.
Like Paul Ricard, Nouet again deputises for listed co-driver Valentin Hasse-Clot who is again preoccupied with his GT4 racing duties within the FFSA GT4 Series second round this weekend at Magny-Cours.
Photo credits – Teams / ELMS / Le Mans Cup
Split fortunes for the Oman Racing GTE crews at Paul Ricard yesterday
Showing great pace earlier in the proceedings with their #69 crew of Ahmad Al Harthy, Sam De Haan and Marco Sorensen by having claimed a P2 start to Sunday’s opening four-hour race in only their first GTE ruleset race meeting together, their debut race was to unfortunately end even before they had completed the end of the opening lap.
With a mixture of forty-two LMP2, LMP3 and GTE cars competing for track space around the open Le Castellet circuit in the south of France, an incident within the LMP3 field ahead on the opening lap lead to De Haan being side swiped by a debris avoiding prototype car – contact that would immediately lead to race ending steering and suspension damage as De Haan was forced to park his car just onto the start straight but crucially already beyond the track entrance to the pit lane.
Whilst that side of the TF Sport garage would take no further part in the event, the #95 car of John Hartshorne, Henrique Chaves and Jonny Adam would go onto to enjoy their probably their best event yet in the series to start their year with a robust race and finish.
Having Qualified at the tail end of the twelve GTE runners, although not on track at the start of the race as a number of cars would be starting from pit lane, it looked at if the red and white liveried car would struggle to elevate itself up from that position as the race progressed.
However, two good stints from Hartshorne and Chaves found the car as high as fifth in class by the car was handed over to AMR Factory driver Adam to see out the race. Eventually completing this opening round in P6 in class, that secured the crew vital points in the Championship as it now looks to its second round from Imola next month.
Photo credits – TF Sport / Andrew Lofthouse
Wood and McKay confirmed as first Racing One AMR entry into the ADAC GT4 Germany
Last seen out in one of Academy Motorsport’s Aston Martin’s in the British GT Championship in 2018 and then in the GT4 European Series with the team in 2019, the twenty-year-old from Castle Donington has since been keeping himself race ready within the Nurburgring Langstrecken Series.
Scottish racer Euan McKay also needs no introduction either to Aston Martin Racing fans after his impressive, albeit brief association with the Oman Racing with TF Sport AMR Vantage GT3 entry into the 2017 Gulf 12Hr
This news is the first confirmation of an entry into the ADAC series from the German team but takes the confirmed AMR crew entry into the series so far up to eight after four from the Dorr Motorsport team, two from the Prosport Racing team and another from the Team Racing Monkeys team.
After a test with the team at the Nurburgring only last week, it should be a comfortable transition into race mode as the series looks ahead to its opening weekend of the season next week from Oschersleben.
Photo credits - Team / Drivers
