British GT Championship – Silverstone Afraid Of Nothing After a highly successful trip to Brands Hatch in August that saw the team claim the GT3 team title, Lotus Sport Cadena returned in force to compete in the final round of the British GT Championship, in a two hour race on the Silverstone International circuit. Sam Blogg and George Mackintosh still led the drivers’ championship, but only by half a point from the Barwell Motorsport driver Leo Machitsky and it was a simple fact that whichever of the #20 Exige and the #33 Aston Martin DBRS9 finished ahead of the other on Sunday would win the title.
Saturday It turned out that the team was ‘borrowing’ one of the cars, as Barrie Whight explained; “We’ve actually sold chassis CR1, which was mine and Gavan’s old car, and the plan was that the new owner would come and race it here. That turned out not to be possible, but he said that we could still race it. We’ve swapped chassis for this race, so our car is the former #18 and vice versa.”
The vacant seat alongside Paul Whight in the #18 was filled by Mark Fullalove (below); the only one of the team’s drivers this year not to have come directly from racing a Lotus elsewhere. So how had the drive come about?
This would be Fullalove’s first race since 2003, when he competed in the BTCC production class, but before that he raced in two seasons of the Autobytel Lotus Championship, wining the title in 2001, so clearly he was no stranger to this type of racing. Even so, he arrived at Silverstone having experienced just ten laps around Hethel in the Exige, and torrential rain during Friday testing meant he didn’t get much seat time during that session. Barrie Whight was in a relaxed mood on Saturday morning, having only recently arrived back from his honeymoon and he and Gavan Kershaw were looking forward to getting back to racing after missing the previous round.
But while the drivers of numbers 18 and 19 would be racing for ‘fun’, Sam Blogg and George Mackintosh had a title to race for. They knew that they couldn’t realistically expect to beat Machitski’s Aston on pace, but their car had performed faultlessly all year and had so far had a perfect finishing record. This was shaping up to be a classic ‘Tortoise v Hare’ confrontation. With there being just the one race on Sunday, track action on Saturday was restricted to 60 minutes of free practice (reduced from 75 minutes owing to fog earlier in the morning) and two 15 minute qualifying sessions.
Practice was uneventful for all three cars, with a slowly drying track rendering all times posted meaningless and when qualifying arrived four hours later, things didn’t go quite as well as had been hoped. “The car feels a bit down on power today,” began George Mackintosh, “and strangely I set my best time on my last lap rather than in the early stages. Mind you, that’s probably down to a combination of traffic and an old head – I really needed a 45 minute session,” he joked. With the fastest times from both sessions determining grid positions, it was Sam Blogg’s 1:31.123 that counted and the car would start from 23rd spot on the 29 car grid. For #19, there was a similar tale to be told; “We feel like we’re a bit down on power,” said Barrie Whight; echoing Mackintosh’ words.” The car doesn’t feel as free-revving and powerful as it did at Rockingham. But it’s handling well and things aren’t too disastrous. It’s just that we’re used to being closer to the front.” Gavan Kershaw set the faster time; 1:27.704 being good enough for fifth in class and eleventh overall. For car #18, the problems lay elsewhere. Mark Fullalove’s first BGT qualifying session had gone very well, with his 1:28.530 being less than a second of Kershaw’s pace and good enough for a start position of 13th. However, when Paul Whight started his stint, he found that it was like getting into a different car; “Mark’s session went well, but we changed tyres at the interval and the second set felt like they were made of steel,” explained the team owner. “I just couldn’t get the power down at all.” Sunday As with the previous day’s practice, the warm-up took place on a slippery track and little benefit could be gained in the short time allowed. The two title contenders showed no sign of any ‘pre-match nerves’ and seemed to be enjoying the relaxed air as they chatted to the many guests. But by the time the cars sat on the grid awaiting the race start, all the drivers were focused on nothing else but the task in hand. The grid cleared and the combined GT2, GT3 and GTC field moved off for the formation lap. When the lights turned green, the fortunes for the three Exiges would be very different; at least in the early laps. For Mark Fullalove, it must have been like being back in the BTCC as; “I made up two or three places at the start, but then got tagged by somebody at Abbey and spun down to last place!” A similar fate befell George Mackintosh two laps later when he was broadsided by the #8 GTC Porsche, which had itself been shunted from the rear. “I ended up facing the wrong way on the track with cars going by, which wasn’t too pleasant,” recalled the Scot. “I did wave as I went by,” was Richmond Racing’s Nick Marsh’ not overly sympathetic comment to the Lotus driver after the race. While his colleagues were dealing with their problems, Barrie Whight was having his best start of the season, having gained three places on the first lap. “I had a wicked start,” he said, “and could see even before the first kink that my momentum was better than the cars ahead.
"Once I was by them, I realised that the Astons weren’t getting away. I knew that I could outbrake them and I lined them up and picked them off one by one.”
Such was his progress that Whight went from fifth in class to first within five laps. Once in the lead, he had no intention of giving the place up; “It felt like I could easily maintain the gap to the (Leo Machitski) Aston.” But then, disaster. A camera beaming live pictures from the #33 Aston that had previously shown the Lotus take the lead, briefly showed the same Lotus swap ends and head for the gravel. “I made a silly mistake,” admitted Whight. “A moment’s brain fade or something, and I threw the lead away. The recovery vehicle pulled me out quickly and I managed to shake the gravel out of the car within a lap and didn’t need to stop.” The slip had cost the #19 two minutes and all hopes of a good result seemed to have been dashed. “After that I latched onto Mark and used his pace as a yardstick.”
Fullalove’s recovery from his assisted spin was as spectacular as Barrie Whight’s early progress had been. From stone last, he carved his way through the field with a sustained series of consistently fast laps that belied his absence from the race track, and by the 30 minute mark the car was back up to 12th overall and fourth in class. “It was a storming fight back,” reflected the ‘rookie’, “and it was fantastic fun.” After his own spin, Mackintosh found that the handling had been slightly affected by the clash and concentrated on staying out of any more trouble.
Shortly after the half hour mark, the race’s first and only safety car period began as the GT2 Monaro and the GTC Ginetta were recovered from the Becketts gravel. With it being so early in the race, very few cars decided to pit and initially all three Exiges stayed out. But as it became evident that the recovery of the stranded cars was turning out to be more problematical than had at first appeared, first Mackintosh and then Whight decided to make their 90 second refuelling and driver-change stops. Mark Fullalove meanwhile decided to stay out and as the other cars pitted eventually found himself leading the GT3 class, having only recently been at the tail end of it. He eventually relinquished the wheel a few laps after the restart and Paul Whight climbed in for the remainder of the race. Gavan Kershaw found himself a long way behind the next nearest GT3, but there is only one speed in the Kershaw way of thinking and that is flat-out. Over the next hour, the Lotus ace knuckled down to the task of chasing down the cars ahead. This is something that we have seen more than once this season, but not over such an extended time period. For lap after lap he set times just above, but mainly below, 1:30 – including the fastest GT3 lap of the race, 1:28.378 - and he began to reel in the GT3 runners. By lap 44, he had caught and passed Paul Whight in the #18 Exige; Sam Blogg was next on lap 53 followed by Phil Glew in the #15 RPM Porsche 997. His final victim was Martin Stretton in the #88 Barwell Aston Martin who succumbed to the pressure on lap 75, and Kershaw was now in an excellent third place.
Sadly for Sam Blogg and George Mackintosh, the car immediately ahead of Kershaw as the race ended shortly afterwards was the #33 Barwell Motorsport Aston Martin and Leo Machitski claimed the drivers’ title. Unusually for Blogg he had been unable to match his co-driver’s pace, and it wasn’t entirely down to the car’s handling problem; “I was racing with a scaphoid fracture in my wrist,” was his starling revelation. “I got it when I fell off a lorry,” he continued, “and all I could do was get to a pace that I was comfortable with.” Paul Whight had had his own problems, having again encountered a lack of grip from the car’s rubber; “The car was solid, but the grip was non-existent when I was powering out of corners,” he explained. “I had a huge tank-slapper that put me on the grass midway through the stint, and then Ian Flux barged me out of the way in his Mosler with two laps to go.”
Despite the disappointing results, all three cars had finished the two hour race and there were many positives to take away.
“Yes, Barry had a mishap, but that happens to all of us,” he continued. “When I got in, the only instruction was to enjoy the stint and if anything else was possible then go for it.” “For Gav to reel in Martin Stretton like that
and unlap himself from (GT3 race winner) Piers Masarati shows that
the fastest car didn’t win today,” added Barrie Whight.
“After qualifying, we didn’t think we had a hope in
hell of being competitive in the race,” he continued, “but
we finished the weekend with a strong result. Things should perhaps
have gone even better, but it’s clear that the car’s
pace was better than the result shows.” “Overall, the whole season has been great fun.” It was Barrie having the podium fun, below - but George was clearly still very satisfied.
Gavan Kershaw found time to pay tribute to his team; “Today has been a big test for them. We’ve had the most number of trucks, the most number of guests (including some very important persons from Lotus) and they have presented themselves completely professionally.” And so the first season in GT3 came to a close for Lotus Sport Cadena. The team’s contribution to the 2006 British GT Championship had been immense, and more importantly it had developed the Exige into a very potent and race-winning machine. The car will shortly be homologated for FIA GT3 and then, who knows? The future is exciting for both car and team, and the last word goes to Barrie Whight; “One series or another, Gavan Kershaw and Barrie Whight will be back together for the full season and will be going for a title. We know that we can do it, we have a good bond, a great car and we’re not afraid!” Amen.
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“Well,
I’ve worked for Lotus in sales and marketing at Hethel for
about six years,” he explained, “and I know the team
well. I knew there was a drive going and so worked on getting a
package together for this race.”
“We
had a really good, solid race car for the full two hours today,”
said Gavan Kershaw. “This was the first time that we’ve
had virtually two hours of green flag racing and the car didn’t
go away at all.
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