British GT Donington Park 7th & 8th September 2024
COLLARDS PLACE ONE HAND ON THE CROWN
The British GT Championship returned to Donington Park for the penultimate round of the 2024 season over the weekend of the 7th and 8th of September, competing on the Grand Prix layout.
GT3: The championship standings were headed by the two Barwell Motorsport Lamborghini Huracans arriving in Leicestershire. Father-and-son pairing Rob and Ricky Collard held a slender five-point lead from teammates Alex Martin and Sandy Mitchell, who were denied a victory double last time out at Snetterton after being judged to have overtaken under yellow flags and led to them getting slapped with a 30-second penalty post-race. Adam Smalley and Shaun Balfe have already wrapped up the Silver-Am trophy with their Duckhams-liveried McLaren 720S and also have their eyes on the overall prize. The fourth-placed Ian Loggie and Phil Keen have swapped from one retro colour scheme to another as they moved from the D2-liveried Mercedes AMG GT to a Porsche 992 GT3 that carries the colours of the 1998 Le Mans 24 Hours winner. Tom Gamble and Mark Radcliffe's Optimum Motorsport McLaren came into the meeting fifth on the table, just 3.5 points behind the 2Seas Motorsport pair in fourth. The remaining 2Seas Motorsport Mercedes was next in the standings in the hands of Kevin Tse and 2021 DTM champion Maximilian Götz and the duo have won two of the last three races after a steady start to the year, with the similar Team Abba Racing car of father-and-son duo Richard and Sam Neary next up in seventh. Morgan Tillbrook and Marcus Clutton took a couple of fourth places earlier in the year but withdrew from the last meeting so the Garage 59 McLaren started the weekend eighth, with the Greystone GT Mercedes of Mike Price and Callum MacLeod in ninth. Three of the Aston Martin Vantage Evos were in the field, with the Blackthorn Pro-Am car of Giacomo Petrobelli and four-time British GT champion Jonny Adam best placed in tenth and was sat four points ahead of their Silver-Am teammates Josh Rowledge and Matt Topham. The third of the Prodrive-built machines was handled by twice title-holder Andrew Howard and Aston Martin F1 ambassador Jessica Hawkins. The rapid Raffaele Marciello departed the championship in the lead-up to the event, his place alongside John Ferguson in the RAM Racing BMW M4 GT3 taken by factory driver Max Hesse.
The British GT Championship returned to Donington Park for the penultimate round of the 2024 season over the weekend of the 7th and 8th of September, competing on the Grand Prix layout.
GT3: The championship standings were headed by the two Barwell Motorsport Lamborghini Huracans arriving in Leicestershire. Father-and-son pairing Rob and Ricky Collard held a slender five-point lead from teammates Alex Martin and Sandy Mitchell, who were denied a victory double last time out at Snetterton after being judged to have overtaken under yellow flags and led to them getting slapped with a 30-second penalty post-race. Adam Smalley and Shaun Balfe have already wrapped up the Silver-Am trophy with their Duckhams-liveried McLaren 720S and also have their eyes on the overall prize. The fourth-placed Ian Loggie and Phil Keen have swapped from one retro colour scheme to another as they moved from the D2-liveried Mercedes AMG GT to a Porsche 992 GT3 that carries the colours of the 1998 Le Mans 24 Hours winner. Tom Gamble and Mark Radcliffe's Optimum Motorsport McLaren came into the meeting fifth on the table, just 3.5 points behind the 2Seas Motorsport pair in fourth. The remaining 2Seas Motorsport Mercedes was next in the standings in the hands of Kevin Tse and 2021 DTM champion Maximilian Götz and the duo have won two of the last three races after a steady start to the year, with the similar Team Abba Racing car of father-and-son duo Richard and Sam Neary next up in seventh. Morgan Tillbrook and Marcus Clutton took a couple of fourth places earlier in the year but withdrew from the last meeting so the Garage 59 McLaren started the weekend eighth, with the Greystone GT Mercedes of Mike Price and Callum MacLeod in ninth. Three of the Aston Martin Vantage Evos were in the field, with the Blackthorn Pro-Am car of Giacomo Petrobelli and four-time British GT champion Jonny Adam best placed in tenth and was sat four points ahead of their Silver-Am teammates Josh Rowledge and Matt Topham. The third of the Prodrive-built machines was handled by twice title-holder Andrew Howard and Aston Martin F1 ambassador Jessica Hawkins. The rapid Raffaele Marciello departed the championship in the lead-up to the event, his place alongside John Ferguson in the RAM Racing BMW M4 GT3 taken by factory driver Max Hesse.
Qualifying: The first ten-minute qualifying session was contested by the Amateur and Silver-graded drivers that would start the race in tricky conditions with a dry line emerging. 2Seas Motorsport's Kevin Tse was first out of the pitlane, whilst the Barwell Lamborghinis waited for clear space before venturing out from the pits and the fastest times would come towards the end of the short session. Title contender Alex Martin was fastest after the first flying laps were completed before the 2020 GT3 champion Rob Collard pipped his teammate next time round. The Blackthorn Aston Martin of Matt Topham split the Lamborghinis with ninety seconds left before Martin bumped the Aston back to third place just as the flag came out but Tse put in a storming final lap to leap to the top of the times by 0.023 seconds from Collard and Martin in third. Mike Price vaulted up to fourth at the death after a spin earlier in the session at Goddards, with Topham and stablemate Giacomo Petrobelli making up the top six. The Professional graded drivers joined the fray for the second ten-minute spell and the aggregated times from the opening period would determine the grid. The Barwell Lamborghinis quickly replaced the 2Seas Mercedes at top the of the standings before Maximillian Götz put the AMG GT back to the top but Collard soon put the Huracan ahead again to claim pole position by just 0.036 seconds from the German machine. The second Barwell Lamborghini was a slim 0.088 seconds from their teammates but would start from the inside of the second row and would be joined by the Greystone GT Mercedes, after Callum MacLeod kept the car in fourth. Tom Gamble moved the Paddock Motorsport McLaren forward to fifth at one point after setting the session's second-quickest time but was bumped back to tenth place as the session-fastest Max Hesse, Josh Rowledge, Jonny Adam, Adam Smalley and Marcus Clutton each stepped up to demote the McLaren. All sixteen cars in the GT3 field qualified within one second of each other.
Race: The Greystoke GT team had some extra work to do on Sunday morning after Mike Price crunched the fourth-placed Mercedes into the tyres during the morning warm up at McLeans. The morning rain had given way to much drier and brighter conditions for the race start and the two hours got underway with Rob Collard leading Barwell teammate Alex Martin into Redgate, whilst contact between fast-starting John Ferguson BMW sent the front row starting Kevin Tse into the gravel. Martin's Lamborghini, the BMW and the Mercedes were briefly three-wide before Tse swept in from the outside and spun across the nose of the RAM Racing car. The Mercedes was eventually dug out of the gravel and rejoined just ahead of the fourth place battle two laps down, with the Mark Smith McLaren also driving through the gravel in avoidance. Collard, Martin, Ferguson, Mike Price, Giacomo Petrobelli and Morgan Tillbrook formed the top six at the end of the opening lap, with the top three getting away from Price et al as Mark Radcliffe's McLaren and Matt Topham's Aston Martin joined the back of the queue behind the Greystone Mercedes in the early stages. The leading Lamborghinis soon started to stretch away from the BMW in third as Ferguson contended with a drivetrain issue which saw him slow on the climb to Coppice on lap three before eventually pulling off on the Exhibition Straight, which left the Barwell Motorsport pair well clear of Price in third. The battle didn't take long to grow in intensity as Petrobelli was all over the Mercedes on the GP loop before Tillbrook attempted a move on the outside of Redgate starting the fourth lap. Price and Petrobelli got away from Tillbrook after the move failed to come off as Richard Neary, Carl Cavers and Shaun Balfe got onto back of Topham. Petrobelli got down the inside of Price into Melbourne on lap five to take third place, with Tillbrook next to press Price and the McLaren moved into fourth at the Melbourne Hairpin at the twelve-minute mark. Neary's Mercedes passed Radcliffe at the start of the following lap for seventh at Redgate before the Optimum Motorsport McLaren was involved in a three-wide moment soon after as Topham got down inside of Radcliffe into the Melbourne Hairpin with Balfe trying to relegate pair of them, the Aston Martin was the winner as the Optimum McLaren stayed ahead of Balfe's Garage 59 example. However, Radcliffe got into the side of Topham almost immediately at Goddards to send the Aston Martin into a half spin and allowed Balfe, Ian Loggie, Sacha Kakad, Cavers and Andrew Howard to sneak past the McLaren as it recovered, with Topham only losing out to Balfe's Duckhams McLaren and the 2Seas Porsche after fending off Kakad's Audi R8 at Redgate. The closely-following Cavers’ BMW smacked into back of Radcliffe's McLaren during the incident but continued, whilst the McLaren and Aston Martin were both forced to pit soon afterwards. The McLaren wouldn't reappear and Topham continued once a punctured tyre had been replaced. The Price Greystone GT car lost out to both Balfe and Neary after nineteen minutes to slip back to seventh place, after the McLaren had passed both Mercedes in a sort out at the top end of the circuit. Loggie was next to threaten the Greystone Mercedes and the 2022 champion pounced during the next lap when Price ventured wide at the Melbourne Hairpin. Kakad then lunged inside Price at Goddards but skated wide and almost lost out to Cavers’ BMW. A short time later, the fourth-placed Tillbrook was forced onto the grass at high speed during lappery approaching McLeans and filled the McLaren's radiator with greenery, which pushed the Garage 59 car back to eleventh after being forced pitwards to clear the intakes of grass. The gaps among the leading GT3 cars began to open out once they’d all dealt with the Price Mercedes, which was forced to make an unscheduled pitstop after half an hour with a puncture. After losing out to Balfe earlier at McLeans, Neary took back fourth place with an aggressive dive up the inside into Redgate after forty minutes. The leading Lamborghinis were lapping around a second apart until lapped GT4 traffic split the pair, with Collard continuing to extend the gap out to more than seven seconds. More frustration was to follow for Martin as he was forced to pit with a front-left puncture coming up to the 44-minute mark after striking the Fogarty's Esses tyre stack, rejoining just ahead of Kakad's Audi R8 in sixth. The leading Lamborghini now enjoyed a near 26-second advantage from the Blackthorn Aston Martin of Petrobelli but the margin was under threat of being wiped out when Kakad's R8 spun onto the grass at Schwantz Curve within seven minutes of the pit window opening but the Audi able to eventually rejoin and avert the nedd for a Safety Car. There was another threat to their lead before the stops when Mark Smith was tapped into a spin at Goddards by Tillbrook’s similar car and the McLaren was momentarily stranded in the middle of the circuit on the hour mark but was able to resume with a spin turn, the Garage 59 McLaren was later given a drive through penalty for the contact. The pit window for the GT3 cars opened after 62 minutes and their teammate's delay had given the Collards a 28.713-second lead by the time Rob came in to swap places with son Ricky and their compensation time from Snetterton was of little concern. Jonny Adam took over the Blackthorn Vantage from Petrobelli to continue in second, some fourteen seconds down, and Sam Neary kept hold of third after taking over from his father in the Abba Mercedes. Adam Smalley retained fourth place in the Garage 59 McLaren, whilst Phil Keen and Sandy Mitchell completed the top six once the stops were done, after the 2Seas Porsche passed the Lamborghini as Mitchell accelerated out of the pits. With just under fourteen seconds to make up after the pit stops, the second-placed Adam began to edge towards leader Collard and got the gap down to just under nine seconds before a Full Course Yellow halted the charge inside the last half an hour after the second-placed GT4 car crashed heavily at the Melbourne Hairpin. The Smalley McLaren was soon catching Neary's Mercedes in third place after the stops with the race's fastest lap, which was on a track limit final warning, and Mitchell's Lamborghini was also closing on Keen's Porsche for fifth place but the pair were being kept apart by the other 2Seas Motorsport car of Maximilian Götz. Mitchell's Huracan was able to pass the delayed Mercedes and began to harass the Porsche with a little over half an hour to go, with Mitchell pulling a great move on Keen when the Porsche was momentarily delayed by the second-placed GT4 Ginetta and the Lamborghini drove around the outside of the Melbourne hairpin to give him inside for Goddards and fifth place with 32 minutes remaining. After circulating under Full Course Yellow conditions to allow barrier repair work to be carried out, the Safety Car was then deployed with twelve and a half minutes remaining to eradicate Collard's advantage but he would at least have the lapped Steven Lake/Nathan Harrison Lotus Emira between them for the restart. The Safety Car came in with one minute and forty seconds to go, enough time for a two-lap dash to the flag. Collard started to back up the field from x before bolting at the Melbourne Hairpin to open a big margin with Adam trapped behind the lapped GT4 car until the start/finish line, the Aston had already fallen 3.706 seconds behind once clear to effectively end his chances of chasing down the Lamborghini. Collard ultimately won as he pleased by 3.212 seconds after a dominant display from the Barwell Lamborghini, whilst Smalley charged to within 0.854 seconds of Petrobelli/Adam in second after the Neary Mercedes ploughed straight on out of third at McLeans after a heartbreaking brake disc failure on the restart lap. Mitchell had six cars lying between the Lamborghini and Balfe/Smalley's McLaren at the resumption so had to settle for fourth place with partner Martin. The Loggie/Keen Porsche took a highly promising fifth on its debut and the Century Motorsport BMW of Cavers/Lewis Plato came home in sixth, whilst the Beechdean Aston Martin was handed a 30-second penalty post-race for causing a collision but didn't affect its overall position of seventh. The Paddock Motorsport McLaren of Smith/Martin Plowman recovered well from its first corner excursion and mid-race rotation to claim eighth ahead of the delayed Topham/Josh Rowledge Aston Martin. The penalised Marcus Clutton Garage 59 McLaren pitted from tenth a couple of laps after serving its punishment for partner Tillbrook's clash with the Paddock Motorsport McLaren and was pushed back into garage with 45 minutes remaining. leaving the Greystone GT Mercedes of Price/Callum McLeod to round out the top ten.
The Collards left Donington Park with an extended margin of 24.5 points at the top of the table over their Barwell Motorsport stablemates Alex Martin/Sandy Mitchell heading to the last round at Brands Hatch, with 37.5 points available. Silver-Am champions Shaun Balfe/Adam Smalley kept in mathematical touch for the overall crown with their third place finish but need to win in Kent and hope that the Collards don't add to their score to stand any chance of stealing the title.
The Collards left Donington Park with an extended margin of 24.5 points at the top of the table over their Barwell Motorsport stablemates Alex Martin/Sandy Mitchell heading to the last round at Brands Hatch, with 37.5 points available. Silver-Am champions Shaun Balfe/Adam Smalley kept in mathematical touch for the overall crown with their third place finish but need to win in Kent and hope that the Collards don't add to their score to stand any chance of stealing the title.
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GT4
The Optimum Motorsport McLaren of Jack Brown and Zac Meakin led the way in the less-modified GT4 category by a slim 2.5 points from the Forsetti Motorsport Aston Martin of Jamie Day and Mikey Porter and by another 4.5 points to the outfit's second Vantage of William Orton and Marc Warren, with the Forsetti Motorsport squad sealing the Teams' championship last time out at Snetterton. Charles Dawson/Seb Morris share a Team Parker Racing Mercedes AMG GT and came into the weekend fourth on the table, whilst the Academy Motorsport by Multimatic Ford Mustang of Marco Signoretti and defending co-champion Erik Evans sat in fifth but the big Fords were hit with the addition of 20kgs Balance of Performance weight prior to the meeting. Ian Gough/Tom Wrigley's Century Motorsport BMW M4 completed the top six. Porsche Junior Scholarship finalist and Castle Combe FF1600 front-runner Alex Walker sat in sixth overall coming into the weekend but wouldn't compete. The Lotus Emira is a model new to the category this year, with the eighth-placed Ian Duggan/Gordie Mutch's Mahiki Racing machine one of two examples in the field. The other half of the 2023 title-winning duo has moved to the Paddock Motorsport team for this year and Matt Cowley shared the Mercedes AMG GT with Ed McDermott.
The Optimum Motorsport McLaren of Jack Brown and Zac Meakin led the way in the less-modified GT4 category by a slim 2.5 points from the Forsetti Motorsport Aston Martin of Jamie Day and Mikey Porter and by another 4.5 points to the outfit's second Vantage of William Orton and Marc Warren, with the Forsetti Motorsport squad sealing the Teams' championship last time out at Snetterton. Charles Dawson/Seb Morris share a Team Parker Racing Mercedes AMG GT and came into the weekend fourth on the table, whilst the Academy Motorsport by Multimatic Ford Mustang of Marco Signoretti and defending co-champion Erik Evans sat in fifth but the big Fords were hit with the addition of 20kgs Balance of Performance weight prior to the meeting. Ian Gough/Tom Wrigley's Century Motorsport BMW M4 completed the top six. Porsche Junior Scholarship finalist and Castle Combe FF1600 front-runner Alex Walker sat in sixth overall coming into the weekend but wouldn't compete. The Lotus Emira is a model new to the category this year, with the eighth-placed Ian Duggan/Gordie Mutch's Mahiki Racing machine one of two examples in the field. The other half of the 2023 title-winning duo has moved to the Paddock Motorsport team for this year and Matt Cowley shared the Mercedes AMG GT with Ed McDermott.
Qualifying: Championship leader Jack Brown headed the first part of qualifying from the Aston Millar DTO Ginetta and nearest championship rival Mikey Porter in third, with the times set early in the spell but Brown was to be investigated post-session for a very late dive into the pitlane at the end of the ten minutes. Jamie Day moved the Forsetti Aston Martin to the top of the times with his first lap in part two from Zac Meakin and Freddie Tomlinson. Tomlinson moved the DTO Ginetta up to second with four minutes to go but Meakin almost immediately bumped him back down to third. There was a repeat of the Ginetta and McLaren swap next time around as Meakin moved to just 0.020 seconds off polesitting Aston and held a 0.196-margin to Tomlinson but there would be no further improvements late in the session with the tyres past their best so the Porter/Day Aston Martin would start the two-hour race from pole postion. The part two session-fastest Matt Nicol-Jones Mustang jumped up to fourth with an early lap after partner Will Moore's tenth-fastest effort in part one before William Orton took away the place with three and a half minutes remaining. The second Academy Mustang of MarcoSignoretti/Erik Evans joined Moore/Nicoll-Jones on the third row in sixth. The second-fastest McLaren was subsequently given a two-place grid drop for Brown’s late entry into the pits but his Optimum Motorsport team lodged an appeal which was rejected on Sunday morning so the Millar/Tomlinson Ginetta moved up to the GT4 front row, with the McLaren moved back to the outside of row two.
Race: The polesitting Aston Martin of Mikey Porter held the GT4 lead into Redgate at the start of the two hours, whilst the Ginetta of Aston Millar fended off the Mustang of Marco Signoretti that came steaming up the outside. Fourth out of the first corner was Marc Warren but the Aston Martin was shoved across the grass at the Old Hairpin for the first time after contact with Zac Meakin's McLaren and the Forsetti Motorsport car tumbled down the order, the Aston Martin was an early pit caller after ten minutes with suspension and body damage after running off on the GP loop. Porter and Millar ran away together in the early stages whilst a train formed behind Signoretti's Mustang in third, with Meakin and the sister Academy Mustang of Will Moore closely following. Harry George's RAM Racing Mercedes was close by too and Ravi Ramyead's BMW was next up in seventh. Signoretti got away from Meakin after Moore made a passing attempt at the Fogarty’s Esses on lap five which saw the Mustang run wide and lose out to Meakin again and Moore then had to fend off George's Mercedes down to the Melbourne Hairpin, which was also getting heat from Ramyead, Dawson and Ian Gough. After the Moore Mustang-induced delay, Meakin caught the sister Mustang in third again after twenty minutes and Moore fell out of his early fifth place when he ran through the Craner Curves gravel trap whilst the leaders were lapping the GT4 squabble. The lead fight hotted up when Millar took advantage of the GT3 Aston Martin of Giacomo Petrobelli lapping them for the first time by diving inside into the Melbourne Hairpin but Porter fended off the Ginetta at Goddards to retain top spot. The DTO car finally got through when the GT3 leaders came up to put a lap on them for the second time after forty minutes, Millar repeating his earlier move by diving inside under braking for the Melbourne Hairpin and the Ginetta quickly pulled clear. A lap later, Meakin slid down the inside of Signoretti for third place at the Melbourne Hairpin but the Mustang used its V8 grunt to edge ahead again up to Goddards. The McLaren continued to be frustrated by big Ford’s straightline advantage but eventually got through after 47 minutes. As the McLaren left the Mustang behind and started to take time from the Aston Martin in second, the American machine was sliding back towards the lead Pro-Am car of Ramyead in fifth. Showing good pace, Meakin was right with Porter in second as the stops approached, with the GT4 window opening after 58 minutes. Dawson and Gough were the first of the leading runners to stop, with Porter, Meakin and Ramyead following suit a lap later and the leading DTO Ginetta came in two laps after them. The pair of Academy Mustangs both came in one lap after the category leaders but the order would be quite different following the stops. The Century Motorsport BMW now in the hands of Charlie Robertson vaulted up from fifth to first after a combination of a 24-second shorter Pro-Am pitstop time and no compensation time to serve paid dividends, thanks in no small part to a great stint from Ramyead that saw the M4 GT4 come into pitlane within ten seconds of the lead pair. The former leaders' Ginetta now sat 17 seconds down after stop, ahead of Erik Evans in the Mustang started by Signoretti. Seb Morris' Team Parker Racing Mercedes, Luca Hopkinson's similar RAM car and Jack Brown Optimum Motorsport McLaren formed the top six after the stops were completed. The polesitting Aston Martin of Jamie Day down slid down to seventh behind Brown after swapping places in the pits, Tom Wrigley was eighth in the BMW brought in by Gough and was sat close behind the Forsetti Aston Martin. News some came through that the third-placed Mustang had been pinged for a pit stop infringement and would have to serve a stop/go penalty for the short stop with forty minutes left to send car down to ninth, the misery was compounded by a slow getaway from the penalty box. The race fell apart for the Academy Motorsport team when the sister car was also forced to pit with gearbox overheating maladies around the same time. Compounding the positions lost during the pitstop phase, the Forsetti Aston Martin was sent on a trip through the Redgate gravel trap after a mix up with the Beechdean GT3 Aston Martin with 35 minutes to go and Day slipped behind Matt Cowley's Mercedes as well as the previously shadowing Wrigley BMW. The lead BMW had got its lead out to over 21 seconds from of Tomlinson in second as third to fifth remained close after Brown's McLaren caught Morris and Hopkinson's Mercedes before a Full Course Yellow was imposed with 26 minutes left. The DTO Ginetta had dramatically crashed out of second place with brake failure at the Melbourne Hairpin, which sent the car hard into the tyre wall but Tomlinson was able to walk away. The lengthy pause to fix the damaged barrier plus remove debris from Day's Aston Martin giving the Fogarty's Esses entry tyre stack a whack, at a cost of a place to the Evans' recovering Mustang and a wheelarch liner, morphed into a Safety Car period which gave Robertson's BMW almost a full lap's advantage with everyone else tucked up behind official's Lotus. The Century Motorsport car reeled off the remaining two laps after the restart with less than two minutes to go and comfortably took the win after an outstanding performance from Ramyead/Robertson. The Team Parker Racing Mercedes of Dawson/Morris came home second from the McLaren of Meakin/Brown that crossed the line third on-the-road third but the Optimum Motorsport Artura was hit with a 30-second penalty for speeding during the Full Course Yellow to drop car to eleventh in GT4 and fourth of the Silver crews. The sister Century Motorsport BMW of Gough/Wrigley was elevated to the podium as a result after the RAM Mercedes of George/Hopkinson lost four places in the last two laps. The Steven Lake/Nathan Harrison Lotus Emira was slapped with a similar punishment to the Optimum McLaren to be classified fourteenth in GT4 and tenth Pro-Am crew.
The Mikey Porter/Jamie Day Aston Martin ended the day back in the title race lead by 3.5 points from the penalised Jack Brown/Zac Meakin McLaren, with Donington Park runners-up Charles Dawson/Seb Morris just another four points behind in third.
The Mikey Porter/Jamie Day Aston Martin ended the day back in the title race lead by 3.5 points from the penalised Jack Brown/Zac Meakin McLaren, with Donington Park runners-up Charles Dawson/Seb Morris just another four points behind in third.
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The British GT Championship finale takes place at Brands Hatch on the 28th and 29th of September with the fight for the coveted crown going down to the wire in both GT3 and GT4.