GruppeM– Snetterton– Sunday June 6

The GruppeM Porsche started round six on the front row of the grid and for this race Tim Sugden started the race handing over to Jonathan Cocker. The driver change can’t take place before 23minutes and must be completed before 37 minutes. For today’s race the ‘success ballast’ is gradually beginning to even itself out. Tim and Jonathan still have their 60 kgs but the Ferrari has collected 30 kgs for winning the yesterday’s race, plus the original 10 kgs they had on board; so they now have a total of 40 kgs as opposed to the Porsche’s 60 kilos. It will still handicap the Porsche but might make life a little easier.

The weather was excellent, a little muggy and overcast but still dry. After 2nd qualifying Tim Sugden had planted the GruppeM Porsche 911 GT3-RSR onto the front row of the grid beside arch rivals, Nathan Kinch and Andrew Kirkaldy in the Ferrari 360 GTC. After that very brave overtaking manoeuvre in the previous race Tim Sugden was not going to give the Ferrari and inch as they headed to Riches on the opening lap.

As the lights went green the Ferrari just squeezed in front of Tim and that was basically the way it stayed for 51 laps and one hour. They got within 0.2 secs of the Ferrari but it still just had the edge on top speed. Tim had a brilliant opening session but he thought he had a problem “It felt like a puncture so I told the team to change the rear left when we came in for the driver change… the only problem was that I had forgotten it was brand new tyre.”GruppeM had hoped to get ahead of the Ferrari during the driver changes but the tyre change slowed them up and Jonathan came out just behind the Ferrari. “I really could not do much about the Ferrari, it was quicker than us today, I stayed within a couple of seconds or less all the way through my session but the car was not quite right and felt a bit loose”. The Ferrari will now collect another 20 kilos of ballast that will put it on exactly the same weight as the GruppeM Porsche. The next round is at Castle Combe in Wiltshire and this is another very fast circuit.

With six races behind them and ten to go this years British GT Championship is shaping up to become a classic. The GruppeM Porsche 911 GT3 RSR goes to Castle Combe still leading the British GT Championship but their lead has been trimmed back to three points.

In The GT Cup Class the GruppeM Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car had a tough weekend. After two great qualifying sessions the clutch seized on the Jonathan Rowland and Adam Sharpe #76 car. The GruppeM mechanics worked flat out replace it but with only two hours and a very hot unit they just didn’t make the first race. Then, just before the start of the second race they found the clutch had stuck again so out it all came again and the mechanics once again worked flat out to get the car out onto the back of the grid. This was a pity since it had qualified on pole! But Sharpe and Rowland then started a roller coaster ride of a race working their way through slower cars. Jonathan tells us “It was hard` work but we did have a fair bit of luck with the tail enders and traffic.. without that luck I doubt we would have made it”. It was far from straightforward, they made contact with one slower car and Adam Sharpe had a spin. Despite all this they stormed through the field to take the lead on the last but one lap. This means that Jonathan still leads the Championship and heads off to Round Seven at Castle Combe with a five point lead.