The newly crowned FFSA GT4 Series Silver Champions from the Racing Spirit of Leman team ended their 2024 season endeavours in emphatic style at the weekend with another pair of podium finishes at the SRO Festival finale.

Racing for the final time at the Paul Ricard circuit in southern France, the #74 Aston Martin Racing Vantage GT4 pairing of Victor Weyrich and Matteo Villagomez enjoyed the spoils of a further class win after the into the night race on Saturday before rounding off a very successful season by winning the overall race later on Sunday.

After too many weeks of isolation and lock down to care to remember, this weekend sees the planned restart of the North American IMSA Weathertech Sportscar Championship take place from the scene of the series opening gambit into 2020 season way back in January at the Daytona International Speedway in Florida.

Sadly, the ongoing COVID-19 state of play within the continental United States has left some teams no option but to sit things out with the start of the revised calendar this weekend (maybe more) with one of those teams absent from Daytona being the Heart of Racing team and their Seattle Children's Hospital fundraising Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GTD (GT3) that drivers Roman de Angelis and Alex Riberas were due to drive.


After their disappointment at the Rolex 24 in January where the #23 car suffered race ending damage during the night after a bizarre incident near pit in, the team have placed the continued safety of the team personnel above all of their desire to return to the racetrack.

Whilst we hope that they decide to make a return at the next round at Sebring in just a couple of weeks time, that is yet to be confirmed particularly as many counties within the State of Florida continuing to experience dramatic rises in their CV-19  infection rate.


For the IMSA supporting Michelin Pilot Challenge Series, we will have to wait until the weekend of the 17-18th July at Sebring to see the colourful collection of the four expected full season Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT4's return to the track.

Then next weekend we have the SRO sanctioned GT4 America Series restart their 2020 calendar at the picturesque Virginia International Raceway after their last round was dramatically cancelled with cars on track during Free Practice at St Petersburg.


No entry list has yet been confirmed but we do expect to see most of the seven teams that enter an AMR Vantage GT4 in both the Series Sprint and Sprint X races to attend. Most teams in this series haven't raced since the opening rounds from the Circuit from the Americas back in early March where both the Flying Lizard AMR of Micheal Dinan and Rearden Racing AMR of Paul Terry diced things out over both races for the top step of the Sprint podium.


Whilst we will obviously miss the bigger Vantage GTD from the IMSA proceedings this weekend, we can't wait to see the many AMR Vantage GT4's get back to business at both Sebring and VIR over the next couple of weeks.


Whilst IMSA at Daytona will be restricting public access to low numbers of residents of Florida only and the GT4 America Series at VIR will have no public access permitted - its a start so let's get back to racing!!

Photo credits - IMSA / GT4 America

Last seen out on track at the very last track meeting to actually start proceedings with what was already then a revised race schedule at St Petersburg in Florida, Canadian race driver Fred Roberts is just one of a long line of drivers in the USA to have made the switch to the Aston Martin Racing marque for what should have been a full and exciting season within the SRO GT4 America Series.

Under the watchful eye of Generation AMR's young Pro driver Matt George, Roberts auditioned his #89 Recstuff Racing prepared AMR Vantage GT4 at the opening round of the Sprint Series from the Circuit of the Americas earlier this month where he came away with two good finishes.


The next Sprint round was supposed to have been at St Petersburg just a week later but local government COVID-19 restrictions put pay to that event just as the GT cars had completed their first practice session and whilst we all wait for movement restrictions to be lifted and the threat of viral infection removed, what is interesting is just where Roberts new car has come from.

Whilst his fellow AMR competitors in the series have purchased new race cars from AMR's North American partner CSJ Motorsport, Roberts secured the purchase of a certain used 2019 specification AMR Vantage GT4 with a Championship winning provenance under its belt already.


Formally raced in the colours of  #11 Beechdean AMR in the 2019 British GT Championship, this is of course the car that Kelvin Fletcher and Martin Plowman drove to secure their GT4 Pro-Am last year.

Although having raced under the Beechdean team name, we understand that the car was actually owned by the title sponsors of the car and was sold (to Roberts) as soon as Fletcher/Plowman and sponsors had decided to return to the Championship in 2020 with a Bentley GT3.


The next round of the GT4 America Series is due to be from Lime Rock Park in Connecticut at the beginning of May but that is sadly, yet to be confirmed.

Photo credit - (Team celebration) Jacob Ebrey

On what has quickly become a 'dark day' for motorsport worldwide, at least there may be some motor racing taking place this coming weekend as the GT4 America Series continues to support the Indy-car Firestone Grand Prix of St Petersburg event - but with restrictions and with a revised schedule.

In the wake of the growing public exposure issues with the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, todays loss of the FIA WEC event and postponement of the IMSA race from just up the coastline in Sebring as well as the now cancelled Formula 1 opener from Australia, this event will now be only be run with restricted access for essential personnel only within the confines of the street circuit. The opening round of the Asia GT Festival should also have been this weekend before the cancellation of that event some weeks ago.

All other public access has been cancelled on the order of the city Mayor if the event even runs at all.


Whilst that official confirmation is yet to be received, we already know that despite the four Aston Martin Racing V8 Vantage GT4's that competed at the opening round of the SRO Sprint Series from the Circuit of the Americas just last week, this weekend's race will consist of the sole AMR entry from Fred Roberts and his Recstuff Racing prepared car amongst the thirteen car entry.

When we enquired with CSJ Motorsport (AMR's North American strategic partner) as to why there was such a decline in team interest, the answer was simple - the hard concrete walls just off the racing line around the entirety of the temporary street circuit!!


Bronze ranked driver, Roberts ran his first Sprint races in the two fifty minute Sprint Series races of last weekend under the watchful eye of Generation AMR Pro driver Matt George. He has now returned to the UK so (if the event even goes ahead of course) this event will show up just how much he has learned in his return to the racetrack. Whilst the #89 car finished each race over last weekend, his best result came in Sundays Race 2 where he finished P13 overall and P8 in the Am class.

We wish everyone well with this and in more ways than one!

Photo credits - GT4 America / CSJ Motorsport