Friday 19th December 2003

2004 British GT Championship

New season with a new organiser

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The big change for 2004 in British GTs is actually at the top. Frenchman Stephan Ratel has been brought in to organise the series. Ratel has done great things for GTs abroad, ramping up the French series from a 20 car grid to a 60 car grid in a few years. He's also promoted the successful FIA GT championship so he knows his onions.

Ratel's emphasis is firmly on making GT racing as cost effective and as accessible as possible. In the launch on Thursday night he made it clear that he believes GT racing is about seeing 'Dream' cars on the circuit battling it out - i.e. the Porsches, Lambos, Vipers of this world. Hot hatches certainly don't fall within his vision of what GT racing should be about.

The 2004 season will be made up of sixteen rounds at eight events:

April 3/4	Donington	1 & 2
May 8/9	Mondello Park, Ireland	3 & 4
June 5/6	Snetterton	5 & 6
June 19/20	Castle Combe	7 & 8
July 17/18	Oulton Park	9 & 10
August 13/14/15	Silverstone*	11 & 12
August 29/30  (bank holiday)	Thruxton	13 & 14
October 1/2/3	Brands Hatch	15 & 16

* Supporting the Le Mans Endurance Series 1000km

There will be three classes in 2004. GT for monster cars like the Lister, Saleen and Porsche GT2 etc, all producing 600bhp, N-GT for less powerful (400bhp) TVRs, Moslers, Ferraris etc, and the GT Cup for smaller cars such as the VX220's, Elises.

Each meeting will consist of two 45 minute free practices, two 20 minute qualifying periods and two sixty minute races (one on each day). Up to 35 cars will be accepted for the forthcoming season.

The boat's been rocked a bit since Ratel's appointment particularly as some teams found that their cars weren't eligible only from articles in the press. Teething troubles aside though we can expect Ratel to have a very positive effect on the series and hopefully attract some serious machinery and large grids back to British circuits. We wish him every success.

[anonymous-user]

I fail to see why a TVR couldn't effectively compete in the GT 'Dream' class. The new Typhon platform is just the ticket. They've got 500bhp now in road trim. PW wants 550. 600 for racing shouldn't be a problem. Can leave the Sagaris for the N-GT class.

[anonymous-user]

Ted, can you please clean this up - seems we both started this thread at the same time - interestingly, both we exactly the same gripe - that TVR isn't considered in the top class!

[PetrolTed]

Carry on here