Spa 24 Hours: Thursday Paddock Notes
The weather in Belgium, indeed across most of Western Europe, is swelteringly hot: yesterday saw the highest ever temperature officially recorded in the county, hitting 38.9 degrees at a military base outside Brussels. The weather is set to break, however, potentially during the race, with a thunderstorm on Saturday set to drop the mercury from the high 30s Celsius to the mid-20s.
The situation is not too unbearable for the drivers, however, with all GT3 cars running air-conditioning systems these days – as much to keep the electronics cool as the ‘nut behind the wheel’. As Garage 59 Aston Martin man Andrew Watson describes it: “The air-conditioning is great – I wouldn’t say it makes things easy, but it’s not too bad. We’ve got four settings on it and we haven’t needed to use the top one until today! The tyre degradation is high in the heat, but we’re concentrating on setting up a good race car for the stints – we’re not so worried about qualifying. The tyres don’t feel too bad, just the lap times are affected by the heat.”
Garage 59 have had an up-and-down Blancpain Endurance campaign thus far in 2019, as Watson recalls. “I think we’ve had the speed and been doing a good job. At Monza we were top 10, that was okay. In Silverstone we got caught out by a red flag in qualifying, so we had to start further back and then Come [Ledogar] just got caught up in a shunt. We were running in second in Paul Ricard and then had a mechanical problem, which was a shame, so a good result here would be very welcome.”
Also at the wheel of an Aston is R-Motorsport’s Matt Parry, entered in the #62 Vantage alongside Matthieu Vaxiviere and Maxime Martin. “ It’s only the first session, but the car feels good,” he told DSC during free practice. “Blancpain has changed in the last few years; I haven’t been doing it for long, but as I understand it when you used to bring a new car to the grid, it would start off strong, you’d be able to work the Balance of Performance to your advantage.
“Now I think the drivers and teams are at such a high level that a new car is at a disadvantage, as you need time to understand it. We’ve struggled a little with getting on top of the car, but we’ve taken advantage of running in the Sprint Cup as well to gather a lot of data, so where we are now is good.
“I love working with the guys here and the camaraderie that comes with taking on events like the Spa 24 together. I’m very happy with my ‘racing life’ right now and hopefully can stay here for many years to come. I would be happy to spend 10 years here, as we’ve seen with guys like Alex [Buncombe] and Lucas [Ordonez] at RJN.”
In addition to his driving, Parry is also kept busy with Peak Performance Management – a driver management company he runs in partnership with Estonian racer Kevin Korjus, with a stable of rising F3 and F4 stars under guidance.
The official entry for the race has now dropped from 73 to 72 cars, with the withdrawal of the #28 Daiko Lazarus Lamborghini from the Silver Cup ranks. British GT’s Graham Davidson, meanwhile, has taken over from Mike Hedlund in the sister #27 car (above).
Elsewhere, Strakka Racing has built up a replacement for the #43 Mercedes (above) after a shunt in the Bronze Test, with the replacement car being despatched from the UK overnight.
Also in trouble today during Thursday’s Free Practice 1 was Oman Racing with TF Sport. Salih Yoluc suffered a heavy off at Raidillon in the #97 Aston Martin. The driver is mercifully fine but the car suffered chassis and bodyshell damage, as well as a pair of wrecked front corners. Happily, the team has the #47 car from British GT still here, and that has now been pressed into service (below). The team is working to transfer over the relevant bits and pieces and is expected to get back on track later today.
TF Sport was one of only three teams to make the trip from Barcelona over the past few days; the others being Villorba Corse – which raced last weekend in Michelin Le Mans Cup and ELMS – and AF Corse – which is at every race meeting everywhere anyway! Elements of the Proton Competition team are here to support Christian Ried’s Porsche 911 GT2RS Clubsport efforts and elements of Jota Sport are here, too, supporting the expanded R-Motorsport effort
KCMG is here with its full-season two-car entry: one car the regular IGTC GT-R, the other one of the team’s full-season ADAC GT Masters Nissans, after the second IGTC car was destroyed in a crash at the Nürburgring 24 Hours by an unsighted Porsche Cayman failing to see that the Nissan had responded to an incident ahead under caution and hitting Josh Burdon’s car at very high speed. The same pair is then due to be despatched to the Suzuka 10 Hours next month.
The paddock area for the single-make Porsche demo race for its brand new – GT2-bound – 911 GT2RS Clubsports, plus a handful of the new 935s in support, had plenty to offer, too. Christian Ried was looking forward to sampling his new GT2 (above), with the car delivered to his workshop just as the team was departing for Barcelona.
“I’ve barely had a chance to sit in it before this weekend!” he told DSC. This will be the first SRO-organised race for Christian since 2006 “I moved over to ELMS when they shortened the races for FIA GT,” he continued. “It’s good to be back in this paddock.”
Also enjoying the prospect of his new toy was Egidio Perfetti, with his Mentos-liveried 935 (above) looking very ‘retro’. Egidio’s Project 1 WEC team-mate Jorg Bergmeister is in attendance, too, as part of the Porsche support for what could turn out to be a very significant future category.
The 2015 ELMS LMP3 Champion and all-round British sporting legend Sir Chris Hoy will follow up his guest appearance in the British Grand Prix-supporting Porsche Supercup race with an outing here in a 911 GT2RS Clubsport (below).
Mexican Ricardo Sanchez is one of a number of former Nissan GT Academy winners who’ve managed to carve out a new path for themselves in motorsport following the conclusion of the Japanese brand’s works GT3 programme. He joins Matt McMurry, Philipp Frommenwiler and Struan Moore in Jenson Team Rocket RJN’s #22 Honda NSX Silver Cup entry this weekend.
“I knew the Nissan programme could finish at the end of any year, really,” he said. “So ever since I won GT Academy, I’ve been working to find other sponsors and I was lucky enough to find Grupo Indi, a Mexican construction company. They’ve backed me to do some LMP2 and LMP3 races, and when the Nissan contract ended, we decided to look at GT3 opportunities.
“I’m hoping to prove to Honda, or any manufacturer, that I can be quick. The last year in the Nissan was hard, as it was an older-spec car and we weren’t competitive, but this is the life of a racing driver – you always have to be looking out for new sponsors and options, and thankfully I’ve found this one.”
“My sponsor likes the Indy 500, because of the name! But of course, it depends on budget; Indy is very expensive. So even GT3 in America again would be great. I did Pirelli World Challenge in 2017 and the atmosphere in the States is very different; very friendly and nice and also competitive. But it will be all down to the company’s strategy, where they want to go.”
“Spa this weekend is my first time racing the Honda, but I’ve done a test,” Sanchez continued. “The car feels really good on the brakes and under traction, and it gives you a lot of confidence in the high-speed corners, but I think it’s very sensitive to setup. So hopefully we’ll find a good balance for the race, which is apparently going to be almost all wet, so nothing we do here or in qually will matter!”
DSC also asked Sanchez’s team boss Bob Neville about the possibility of the Jenson Team Rocket effort expanding to two cars, potentially for the 2020 season. “We thought about the possibility of a second car at the start of the year, but we missed it by a mile,” he replied. “We were delighted to run one and that’s how we’ll finish the season. We’d love to run a Pro car; what we’re very keen to do is to advance Silver drivers who’ve come to us and been loyal to us.
“So if there’s a Pro car there, even if they’re not in it on day one, it’s there for them to step into if they do a good job. But we’d need more involvement from Honda to make that work. So at the moment we carry on as we are. We’re not looking to replace the Nissan GT4 programme with anything, we’re fully focused on the Honda project.
“We’re feeling quite comfortable about the race; the Silver Cup is incredibly competitive, but there are fewer cars here than there were at Ricard, so if we can keep it clean I think we’re aiming for a podium. We’re seventh in the championship, but fourth to seventh are close on points, so we could still wind up in the top three.”
Norwegian driver Christian Krognes formed one-third of the 2018 Spa 24 Hours overall winning crew alongside Tom Blomqvist and Philipp Eng, and this year is driving the #34 Walkenhorst BMW M6 alongside Nick Catsburg and Mikkel Jensen.
“It’s great to be back, I really love this place,” he told DSC. “I’ve done this race twice now and enjoyed them both – especially the last one of course! It’s my first time driving the car in temperatures like this; it’s what I expected, it’s moving around a bit more on the tyres. The air-con is one of the stronger points of the M6, it’s mostly used to cool down the electronics, but we can get the airflow, too. It’s helpful in these conditions but it’s still hot!”
“Even with the new cars from other brands, I think the M6 is still competitive. We were there or thereabouts on pace at the test so we’re happy. Building on last year’s experience we’ve made some improvements so hopefully that keeps us on terms with the others.”
As many noted after his overall victory in 2018, Krognes is not a full-time professional racing driver – he continues to work full time as an operations manager with a construction equipment supply company at home in Oslo – and there are no plans to change that. “I get to go around the world and drive beautiful race cars and then work at home as well,” he said. “I have a contract with the team; it’s great to have been with them the last four years, I’m fully enjoying my time here, that’s all I can dream of. It’s a way of life I like.”
At Strakka Racing, Gary Paffett forms part of one of Mercedes IGTC-nominated line-ups, alongside Tristan Vautier and Lewis Williamson in the #44 AMG machine. “ I always enjoy my GT3 outings, it’s an enjoyable car to drive, not easy, but it feels natural,” the reigning DTM champion said.
“Endurance is really interesting and a massive challenge. The weekend is drawn out and quite relaxed in some ways, but the competition in GT3 is so high, it’s nearly 24 sprint races back-to-back. We’re capable of finishing high with no mistakes; we want to win, it’s important to qualify near the front and avoid any silly penalties.”
Paffett doesn’t yet know whether he’ll continue in Formula E as this season’s ‘pathfinder’ HWA effort morphs into a full-on works Mercedes team for the electric single-seater championship’s sixth season starting in November. But he is testing the season-six car this summer and expects to stay with Mercedes either way, continuing to tackle GT races for the brand.