Brands Hatch in the sunshine!

The opportunity arose on the Sunday following the Spa WEC race to visit Brands Hatch to see the Blancpain Sprint Series GT race, and I have to admit it was the most fun I’ve had at a motor race for some time. It is nearly fifty years since I first went to Brands (some recollections here), and it remains a great venue for watching motor racing.

Thanks to a little bit of string-pulling, my friend Rod had managed to obtain free passes for my 15-year-old son Robin, him and me, which were easily picked up from the “media awning” just outside the circuit entrance, and parking was conveniently not more than fifty yards away.

We were also entitled to participate in the Grid Walk – I have to admit that the SRO organisation was excellent, and both Rod and Robin were using social media to the full as they mingled! I may not be typical of the modern-day race fan, but the whole atmosphere (along with the sunshine) was a perfect way to draw new fans – a key part of the philosophy of Stéphane Ratel.

We were able to watch the start of the qualifying race from inside the WRT Audi garage, which meant watching the TV monitors on the wall of the pit garage, but nevertheless, HTP’s Jules Szymkowiak was impressive indeed. Entering Paddock Hill Bend alongside the pole-sitting ISR Audi, the 20-year-old Dutchman was four lengths clear as they headed up towards the hairpin. He comfortably controlled the field from the front, and was able to hand the car over to Bernd Schneider (31 years his senior) in a lead that the new Mercedes AMG GT3 wasn’t to lose.

Popping out of the back of the garage to watch the cars racing along Cooper straight and into Surtees – the left-hander leading out onto the GP circuit – provided some close action, but not much overtaking. Someone said it was a bit like Formula Three racing of years gone by, where the cars are very even, and are relatively easy to drive, making distinctions between drivers difficult to spot. A new set of wheel bearings might make all the difference.

We watched the WRT crew carrying out their mandatory pit stop (driver swap and a change of all four wheels) from inside the garage and that was a real thrill for Robin – a chance to experience at first hand the genuine sense of sporting endeavour, involving the whole team.

A hospitality lunch (thank you WRT) was followed by a walk around the paddock, in which we got up close and personal to some rather special supercars and hypercars. This was a round of Stéphane Ratel’s Gentleman’s demo series, and young Robin was highly delighted to take photographs of cars well beyond our means. For him, the sideshows were as important a part of the day as the on-track action, and he came away thrilled at his experience. I suppose sometimes I need to loosen my anorak a bit.

Then it was off for a walk into the woods of the Grand Prix circuit. Here, I was reminded of my first sight of Graham Hill in the flesh, as he walked back from his broken-down Lotus in the 1968 Race Of Champions. And the ghosts of the Portobello woods are never far away – even if someone has put a tarmac rally stage down in the middle of it all!

We watched the start of the main race from just beyond Stirling’s – and although we were standing in the spectator enclosure, it was a pretty intense experience, the like of which you would not experience at Silverstone, or indeed very many other circuits. The cars were so close – to one another and to us – and the fact that we were showered with leaves, twigs and other vegetation after the cars had passed revealed that this was proper, raw, in-your-face racing. No wonder the Brands GP circuit was dubbed the ‘mini-Nürburgring’ when it was opened in 1960. “Inadequate barrierage”, muttered someone on Facebook, and we moved on.

These days, too much motor racing is watched on screens from armchairs, in my opinion. The crowd at Brands was not huge, by any means: the fact that the BTCC was on at Thruxton probably didn’t help. But quite simply, staying at home and watching on TV does not come anywhere close to the experience of watching the action take place before your very eyes. The assault on the senses of 37 GT3 cars, each producing more than 500bhp does not transmit down a wire into your living room… you have to be there.

Next week, I shall be at the Nürburgring to watch 157 cars start the 44th running of the 24 hours through the Eifel Mountains. If I get the chance, I shall certainly go out to Pflanzgarten to mingle with the 200,000 spectators that line the circuit; and the experience will re-ignite my enthusiasm and passion, just as standing at Dingle Dell Corner did when I was still a schoolboy!

(All images by Robin Truswell)

Some Observations from the Silverstone 6 Hours

With apologies that this analysis is not as deep as usual, but nevertheless some thoughts that you may not have read elsewhere.

1) LMP1 just gets better and better
Even if the on-track racing may not have provided the same phenomenal spectacle that was seen at last year’s Silverstone Six Hours, this year’s crop of LMP1 Hybrid racers proved that the march of progress is relentless indeed. Despite a 7.5% reduction in fuel use, Toyota, Audi and Porsche all lapped quicker than last year’s best lap.

Best Lap Times:
2016: Porsche: 1m 40.303s / Audi: 1m 40.461s / Toyota: 1m 40.657s
2015: Audi: 1m 40.836s / Porsche: 1m 42.012s / Toyota: 1m 42.209s
Percentage improvement: Porsche: 1.7% / Audi: 0.4% / Toyota: 1.5%

Top Speeds:
2016: Porsche: 293.5 kph / Audi: 294.3kph / Toyota: 296.7 kph
2015: Porsche: 300.0 kph / Audi: 274.1kph / Toyota: 282.7 kph
Percentage improvement: Porsche: -2.2% / Audi: 7.4% / Toyota: 5.0%

Setup for Silverstone is of course a compromise, with its mixture of straights, fast sweeps and slow corners coming, annoyingly, in every sector. But the data would seem to show that Audi’s balance was about right, whereas Porsche could have perhaps sacrificed a little downforce for a higher top speed – possibly with the benefit of a better average lap time. Perhaps that was the difference between the number one and the number two cars: it was very noticeable in the first phase of the race that the Webber / Hartley car was substantially quicker than that of Dumas / Lieb / Jani, although no explanation for the difference was forthcoming from any official Porsche sources.

It should also be said that, despite the expectations – and despite the result which allowed a Rebellion to be classified in a podium position – reliability among the manufacturer hybrids was good. Porsche lost one car due to driver error and Toyota one due to a puncture. In the end, neither Audi was classified but it is not unreasonable to expect the team to be able easily to address the issue which caused the excessive wear to the skid block that led to the exclusion of the car.

As far as the problem that struck the other Audi R18 e-tron quattro - leaving it stranded in the middle of the track at the Loop as the Full Course Yellow was implemented, I am told that this was caused by ‘human error’, rather than mechanical frailty, so in some ways, the designers, engineers and test teams can be satisfied that their winter travails have been worth the effort.

2) The pecking order
My analysis of the times from the Prologue at Paul Ricard suggested that the times would be close at Silverstone and the best laps shown above reflect that to an extent. In the race itself, the difference in the average of the best 20% of green race laps between the Lotterer/Fässler/Tréluyer Audi and the Dumas/Lieb/Jani Porsche was less than a tenth of a second (the Audi being marginally quicker). The Toyota of Conway/Kobayashi/Sarrazin was around seven-tenths of a second slower in third place on the road. However, as I have already mentioned, the average lap times of the two Porsches in the first portion of the race were 0.66s different, whereas the two Audis were less than a tenth apart and the two Toyotas were separated by just three-tenths of a second.

There certainly seemed to be a difference in the suitability of the tyre compounds being used. Although Porsche, Audi and Toyota all use Michelin rubber, they all have different compounds available to them, and it would seem that Audi lost time in the opening stint on the wrong compound. Toyota made better use of their tyre allocation than Audi or Porsche and saved time in the pits by not changing tyres at every stop. Audi’s pit stops were not as slick as they should have been - in the first two stops, Lotterer and Fässler lost more than twenty seconds to Dumas and Jani.

A fact often forgotten is the turnover of staff that takes place within the teams: many of the tyre-changers at Audi were doing so for the first time in anger during the Silverstone weekend, and Audi’s hard-won reputation for efficiency in the pits needs to be addressed, in my opinion. Arguably, there were various points through the race when strategic mistakes were made by all of the leading teams - surely with a race under their belts, Spa will be better for everyone.

So is Audi really ahead of Porsche? I think not. The evidence from Silverstone isn’t conclusive. Is Toyota really behind? Possibly, but a look at the top speeds shows that the Japanese marque was 10km/h quicker down Silverstone’s big straights: surely that will negate any disadvantage in France in June? Sector times from Spa-Francorchamps –which provide a good indication of performance in slow, medium and high-speed configuration – will be telling.

3) The LMP2 class is good
Silverstone had greater strength in depth in the baby prototype class than we have ever seen. While we have become used to GT cars providing entertainment when attention wanders from the overall lead, LMP2 has taken over that role.

The difference in average lap times across the top four finishers was less than half a second – the RGR Morand Liger, the ESM Ligier, the G-Drive Oreca and the Signatech Alpine. That’s more than the difference between the two LMP1 Porsche 919s.

Ten of the eleven starters made it to the finish – and five of them spent less time in the pits than the ‘winning’ Audi, so there’s not much wrong with either the teams or the robustness of the cars. This year will be the swan-song for the current breed of LMP2, before the new regulations in 2017 – enjoy it while you can!

4) The balance of GTE-Pro needs fixing
If there was a disappointment at Silverstone, it was the GTE-Pro class. The AF Corse Ferrari 488 GTE of Davide Rigon and Sam Bird led every single lap of the race – almost unheard of in GTE races in 2015. The best Ferrari lap (by Bruni in the no. 51) was more than a second quicker than the best lap of any non-Ferrari (Darren Turner in the no. 95 Aston Martin).

The average lap times tell the same story: the Ferraris were 1.3% quicker than the best that Aston or Porsche could manage, and 1.8% faster than the Fords. Moreover, the AF Corse cars spent less time re-fuelling and went further between stops.

The fact that the Bruni/Calado Ferrari was able to recover to finish second, despite a three-minute penalty pit stop was further evidence of the Maranello superiority. The World Endurance Committee will consider adjustments ahead of the 6 hours of Spa-Francorchamps: I cannot imagine that they will not act.

5) ELMS is good
The four-hour ELMS race on Saturday afternoon featured a 44-car grid, 19 of which were in the LMP3 class. Compare this with 30 cars that started the 2015 edition of this race, with just five LMP3 cars. Three different P2 manufacturers in the top three places overall. Harry Tincknell, in the winning G-Drive Gibson, having somewhat blotted his copybook on the opening lap, drove superbly to hand the car over to Simon Dolan in a winning position. Giedo van der Garde, in his final stint was also mighty, setting the car’s fastest lap of the race on the final lap - whether that is a good thing or not is left to the reader to decide!

A one-two result for United Autosports in LMP3 demonstrates that serious engagement garners results – it will be interesting to see how long it is until the team arrives in LMP2. At which point the class can justify its claim as a feeder category.

What about you? Were you at Silverstone? What did you think? If you watched it from home, did you enjoy the coverage? Do you agree with any of these musings? Let me know in the box below!

A Grand Day Out

I had a very good day out at the Guild of Motoring Writers appropriately-titled ‘Big Day Out’ last week. It was held at Castle Combe, in Wiltshire, a track I don’t know particularly well, having only commentated for two race meetings there – the most recent of which was back in 2005, when the British F3 and GT championships visited.

The day had the backing of several manufacturers, including Honda, Fiat and Jaguar Land Rover, but more importantly allowed members to drive their own cars on the circuit. Altogether, I had an hour of driving on the track, and somewhat more than that sampling other cars on the local roads.

Although I normally confine myself to writing about the sport rather than road cars, I had such a good day that I wanted to record it here. I know it’s self-indulgent, but then if I can’t be self-indulgent on my own blog, then where can I be? Especially since I no longer keep up-to-date with my hand-written diary!

Readers may know already that my regular road car – that I have owned since 2009 – is an Audi S4 Avant. The biggest surprise of the day was that I fell back in love with it. Not that I had ever really fallen out of love with it, but I realised once again what a good car it is. It is certainly not a ‘track day’ car (although it does boast 328bhp), and I am certainly not a track day driver, but the car lapped very quickly, was great fun to drive and most important, kept me safe despite a couple of minor misjudgements on my part. The car simply accelerated well, braked well and turned where I wanted it to.

By the end of the day, I was confident enough that I knew the circuit, and had the opportunity to take a Honda Civic Type-R around. With 306bhp compared to my Audi’s 328, but weighing only 1397kg compared to the 2275kg of my car, this pocket-rocket was quite brilliant. It may have lacked some of the subtle refinements of the Audi, with that over-stated rear wing and rather bright red sports seats, but I can easily see how it would appeal to a younger version of myself. After a couple of laps, I pressed the red “+R” button that adjusted the engine mapping, steering and suspension, to make driving more quickly even more of a pleasure. Keeping up with a competently-driven Caterham offering passenger rides up ahead was not difficult, and when the chequered flag was shown to bring the session to a close, I was genuinely disappointed. The car is built just thirty miles away in Swindon, and demonstrates a corporate interest in the sport that the soon-to-be-launched NSX (later this year) will surely continue. Honda at Le Mans? Why not?

The other side of the day was made up of various road cars that could be driven, not on the track but around the byways surrounding the picture-postcard village of Castle Combe itself. There were two absolute stand-out cars here: at very different ends of the spectrum, but both left me smiling broadly as I stepped out of them.

First was the Jaguar XF. Equipped with a three-litre turbo-diesel six-cylinder engine and delivering 296bhp, this car welcomed me into its driving compartment from the moment the door closed with a satisfying ‘thud’. Having previously owned a 1988-vintage Jaguar Sovereign, I expected “grace, space and pace”, but I was pleasantly surprised to find that the 2016 evolution still provided opulence, speed and a general feeling of quality that surpassed anything that I’ve experienced from any of the German manufacturers that are regarded as market leaders.

Its list of features is far too long to describe here; indeed, I could not even manage to explore everything that the car could do in the brief half-hour that the car was at my disposal. But this was luxurious technology for the 21st century – making driving more comfortable, convenient and safe.

Inevitably, such things do not come cheap: the basic on-the-road price is just under £50,000 and the version I drove would have set me back £58,355, but this is an astonishingly well-appointed car. I found it so good that I would give very serious consideration to it when – if ever – the time comes to replace the Audi. These days, when perhaps greater consideration should be given to the country of manufacture, it is good to know that two of the best cars I drove on the day were made in England.

Then there was the Fiat 500. Powered by an 875cc twin-cylinder air-cooled engine, it sounded a bit like an old VW beetle that I drove thirty years ago. But it was such a happy little car – no wonder you see so many of them on the roads. I promise you, I couldn’t stop laughing as I drove it. And when I spotted a fellow Guild member in a Jaguar XE behind, I couldn’t resist showing him how quick the thing was. It may only deliver 104bhp, but it does so extremely well. Kim Palmer from Jaguar was most concerned that we might have been “racing on the public highway”… Of course not, Kim!

The Fiat is, obviously, aimed at a very different consumer from the Jaguar. But it does go to prove that there are different ways of giving driver satisfaction. Back seat passengers would be somewhat squashed, but not impossibly so. And journeys of over an hour might become more wearying than those in the Jag. But if the task is the daily commute, the school run or nipping over to see friends, then I can see no need to consume fuel at the rate that the Jaguar gulps it down, when the Fiat will get you there in the same time, use less fuel and for an outlay of less than a third of the cost of the Jaguar.

Thanks to Guy Loveridge, Chris Adamson, Kim Palmer, Tom Lynch, Puneet Joshi and Nick Mason who between them ensured it was indeed a Big Day Out. And to Jeff Bloxham for additional photographs.

Looking forward to the World Endurance Championship

When I was younger and had fewer responsibilities, I used to dabble in buying and selling stocks and shares. I read many articles describing how the future behaviour of prices could be predicted from an analysis of past performance. Some of what I read made a lot of sense, and I started to do my own analysis, and sometimes – just occasionally – I got this spectacularly right and I began to believe that I might one day become a wealthy man. Needless to say, other times I was not so successful; and I have in any case discovered that there are other things more important that financial success.

I tell you this, not to suggest that you should follow my investment advice, but rather to set your expectations on the outcome of this year’s World Endurance Championship, based on the times set at last month’s Prologue at the Paul Ricard circuit at Le Castellet in the south of France.

The first thing (other than to note that prices can go down as well as up, and that you may lose your shirt if you do not keep to your repayment schedule) is to note that the WEC season has become a saga in three parts. In 2015 that was perhaps more noticeable than ever before. Secondly, Toyota had a spectacularly bad year last year. Although its 2015 car was undoubtedly an improvement on the 2014 version, it became apparent very early in the season – some would say even after the Prologue – that it would be a season to forget for the 2014 world champions.

So even if it is a risky business, it is worth looking at the Prologue in a bit of detail, in an attempt to see what it might mean; initially for the opening round of the championship at Silverstone, and also for the 24 hours of Le Mans in June.

And I’m sorry for those fans of LMP2 or the GTE classes, but I am going to restrict myself here to just looking at the LMP1-hybrid class and the contest for outright wins.

Let’s start off with the headline figure: that of best lap recorded and compare them with 2015:

Car	2015 Best	2016 Best	Percentage Improvement
Porsche 919	1m 37.220s	1m 37.445s	-0.2%
Toyota TS-050	1m 39.949s	1m 38.273s	1.7%
Audi R18 e-tron quattro	1m 39.058s	1m 38.827s	0.2%

Next, my favourite, the best average lap time for a stint of ten laps or more:

Car	2015 Best	2016 Best	Percentage Improvement
Porsche 919	1m 40.5s	1m 39.8s	0.7%
Toyota TS-050	1m 42.0s	1m 41.9s	0.1%
Audi R18 e-tron quattro	1m 40.5s	1m 40.7s	-0.2%

If anything, this just goes to show the difference between best laps and average lap times over a full stint. So just how far were the cars going in a stint?

Car	2015 Longest	2016 Longest	Percentage Improvement
Porsche 919	31 laps	29 laps	-6.5%
Toyota TS-050	29 laps	10 laps	-65.5%
Audi R18 e-tron quattro	30 laps	20 laps	-33.3%

Here is where the story of tyre wear comes in though. The length of the Toyota stint was not constrained by fuel, but by the tyres – according to my information – and the races at both Silverstone and Spa restrict the LMP1-Hybrid teams to just 26 tyres (6 sets plus two ‘spares’) for the race – meaning that at least one set must be used for 90 minutes. This, along with reliability, could well end up deciding the outcome of the first three rounds of the championship.

I mentioned before that there are three phases to the WEC – the bit before Le Mans, the bit after Le Mans, and of course, Le Mans itself. This year, with an extra race in Mexico in the third part of the season, the first two races are relatively less important. Like last year though, Silverstone and Spa make up just two of the nine-race calendar, and just two-tenths of the points. In addition, Silverstone, Spa and Le Mans, although they all have sublime sections of high-speed cornering, are as different from one another in technical terms as any three circuits on the calendar.

So although Silverstone and Spa are important races, one should perhaps not use them to determine what will happen at Le Mans - just as last year, the first two races can throw you severely off the scent. At Le Castellet Porsche, Audi and Toyota spent their time running through some quite different programmes; programmes that were different from one another, but also different from what they did last year. For example, both Audi and Toyota experimented with different aero configurations whereas Porsche stuck to a ‘high-downforce’ set-up. At both Silverstone and Spa last year (as well as at the Prologue) Porsche was concentrating on its ‘low-downforce’, Le Mans aero package. This undoubtedly contributed to its success both at Le Mans and in the championship, but now that the data is gathered, this year will see the team from Weissach attempting to gather points early in the year as well.

Another way to look at the data is to look at the top speeds recorded, again with a comparison to last year’s Prologue:

Car	2015 Top Speed	2016 Top Speed	Percentage Improvement
Porsche 919	338.6 km/h	301.7 km/h	-10.9%
Toyota TS-050	334.4 km/h	340.7 km/h	1.9%
Audi R18 e-tron quattro	313.0 km/h	310.3 km/h	-0.9%

Times through Paul Ricard’s second sector (which includes the main back straight) also indicate that the new Toyota TS050 has prodigious speed, but also confirm that Porsche was most likely running a lot of high-downforce drag during the test.

Rumours suggest that the reliability of the new Audi R18 e-tron quattro is not what the Ingolstadt team has wanted. However, despite spending much of the evening session in the garage at Ricard, Audi actually completed more laps in this year’s Prologue than the car did last year, as the table shows - note that as teams ran two cars each in 2015, I have only included the figures for a single car (the better of the two):

Car	2015 Laps Completed	2016 Laps Completed	Percentage Improvement
Porsche 919	393	372	-5.3%
Toyota TS-050	311	266	-14.5%
Audi R18 e-tron quattro	229	235	2.6%

So what does it all mean? Can we use the data from Paul Ricard to make some predictions about the Six Hours of Silverstone? Is there already a favourite emerging for Le Mans?

Of course, there was a lot more going on during the Prologue than was apparent on the surface. Even the data that I have extracted is far more limited than the teams themselves have. But one thing I have noticed is that the teams tend to be so wrapped up in themselves that they don’t always spot the shape of the bigger picture.

The structure of qualifying remains this year – the two best laps from two different drivers, both of whom have to drive the car during a twenty-minute session. Here’s my prediction for Silverstone then:

Car	2015 Pole time	2016 prediction	Percentage Improvement
Porsche 919	1m 39.721s	1m 39.684s	-0.0%
Toyota TS-050	1m 40.382s	1m 39.574s	0.8%
Audi R18 e-tron quattro	1m 40.352s	1m 40.136s	0.0%

This is the two-lap average, and I have taken into account that Porsche last year at Silverstone had a very similar aero package to the one that they would run at Le Mans, whereas this year they will probably run a higher downforce package. Overall, despite a reduction in fuel consumption allowance of around 7.5%, I expect the times to be very close to those we saw last year. LMP1 fuel tank capacities have also been reduced by an equivalent amount, so the overall stint lengths are probably going to be about the same as they were last year – about 29 or 30 laps. Last year we had two short full course yellow periods, and the race ran for 201 laps (a record). Given some decent weather, some shorter pit stops and clear running, the race should run over 200 laps again this year.

Who’s going to win? There’s no way of knowing. My analysis above indicates that there will be a lot less than a second separating the first three rows of the grid. So much is new: hybrid systems, engines, aero. Michelin brought new tyre compounds to Paul Ricard as well, which further complicates the mix. Although the six hours will be run as a sprint, traditional endurance values like reliability, consistency and efficiency will probably be the deciding factors.

Let’s just hope that the race - indeed the whole season - lives up to expectations!

Celebratory Reflections...

Today I become a year older. It is not a significant birthday, in the sense that I reach a nice round number of years, unless you are one of those people who attach especial importance to prime numbers; and in any case, I am not one of those to celebrate birthdays overmuch. Devoted readers may remember my acknowledgement of the passing of 20,000 days a few years ago – it’s here if you want to go and look, so the fact of my birthday is not a ‘huge big deal’ in my life.

However, I am surprised how many people choose to use the moment to say ‘many happy returns’ on facebook – and I have to say I am also flattered. Perhaps here and now is a good opportunity to thank you for your good wishes – and I hope that I go on to have many more happy birthdays! A wonderful feature of our humanity is that we can choose to pour out goodwill towards our fellow man – simple acts of kindness, if you will.

Yet although we are broadly good-natured animals, there seem to be many occasions when we think only of ourselves and what the outcome will be for us as individuals. With the upcoming referendum in the UK and presidential elections in the US, we have the opportunity to make a choice that will benefit our respective nations – at least one would hope so. More often than not, it simply boils down to a question of whether one can expect to be better off in one situation or another.

None of this has anything to do with motor-racing, of course. But I do not live such a one-dimensional life as you might think. Well, not quite. The point here – as I reflect that another year gone by means another year closer to the grave – is to set a context, and for that you need also to read my previous post speculating on where we might be in six to eight years’ time.

There are currently - without even considering series at a national level - at least four organisations running races for GT3 cars: SRO, the ACO, Creventic and IMSA. There are others, but let’s not get bogged down in detail. Then there is the GTE class of the World Endurance Championship and GT-LM in the IMSA-organised series in the USA.

Now it may be that my mind’s eye has been put a little out-of-focus by a couple of glasses of claret to celebrate my advancing years, but I can envisage a time when there will be a single, worldwide definition for a racing grand tourer. The trouble is that those two (“honestly, officer!”) glasses of wine have obscured the two big obstacles: co-ordination and goodwill.

It strikes me that both of these have to do with the personalities involved: for once I don’t mean the drivers, but the organising bodies. One thing that is remarkable about the current state of GT racing is the cross-over of drivers and teams between the various series and championships. The enthusiasm for participation in endurance events is refreshing, although politics is never far away, it is seldom visible on the surface.

As I have mentioned before, some manufacturers are spending a great deal of money, as are sponsors and some wealthy individuals who are participating. The ones who are not spending any money are the organisers. Their attitude seems to echo that of the unsavoury side of human nature: what’s in it for me?

There is nothing really wrong with this, of course: Darwinism is based on much the same approach, but am I alone in detecting antagonism where there could so easily be co-operation? Competition may improve the breed, but it also divides the market. In a perfect world, such division would not have to exist, and my vision of unity might be possible. Sadly, that’s not the way it is and I don’t see how things will change while there are people out there whose jobs and income depend on the sport. But I fear that is the problem with all professional sport.

Enough of this – it’s time to get on with some racing. And possibly a glass of port.

Speculation about the distant future...

I’m not really one to peer into crystal balls and make predictions about the future, but I do listen to and read what a lot of people are saying and writing about motorsport, whether it is Formula 1, WEC, GT or whatever. I also spend time on my own thinking about those things and the things that history can teach us. One thing that has been gnawing away at me recently is where we might be in, say, eight to ten years’ time. I was half-considering a blog post on the subject, and then this photo from Martin Spetz was posted on twitter – with a caption by Graham Goodwin (the editor of www.dailysportscar.com): “Spot the prototype!” - so here I go:

Although I would hate to see it happen, and at the moment I’ll admit it seems extremely unlikely, but just suppose that the LMP1 technology race self-destructs: that Porsche, Audi and Toyota move out, leaving the playing field to the privateers. Meanwhile, the manufacturers that have been pouring their multi-million dollar R&D budgets into GT programmes want more exposure on the world stage, particularly at Le Mans.

Then reflect on the extent to which sportscar racing categories are already controlled by regulation, and consider how difficult it would be – or not – for the FIA Endurance Committee to come up with a formula that made a full-house manufacturer GT car able to compete with a privately-entered prototype over a long distance race.

It’s not a fanciful possibility. Twenty years or so ago, readers may recall – and if you’re too young, then buy Quentin Spurring’s “Official History” for the 1990-1999 decade – there was such a balance of performance. The Dauer 962 was a GT car (officially), and won the 24 hours in 1994 ahead of prototype opposition from Toyota. In 1996, the Joest-entered TWR-Porsche beat the works 911 GT1’s. In between, of course, a McLaren (entered ‘privately’) triumphed against Yves Courage’s prototype in the hands of Mario Andretti, Eric Hélary and Bob Wollek.

Balancing performance has come a long way in twenty years, and I don’t see any good reason why the ‘privateer prototype’ class that we have in the WEC, along with the American IMSA prototype class, should not be restricted (by different amounts) so that a less-restricted GT class could be within 5% of each other’s lap time. That 5% difference could then be equalised by allowing the GT cars a larger fuel tank and faster refuelling procedures.

Of course, I’m not suggesting that this is going to happen in 2017, or even in 2018. But it strikes me that a solution has to be found to the two struggles going on in endurance racing at the moment: first that the privateer wants to enter races with more than just a class full of privateers as competition; and second, that there seems to be as much or more interest from manufacturer teams in GT racing than in prototypes.

Although Toyota, Audi and Porsche claim relevance of technology transfer from race-track to road car, both Audi and Porsche are already active in the GT3/GTE arena, and Toyotas competes successfully in GT500 racing in Japan with the Lexus brand and surely would not be slow in converting to a new, uprated GT class on the world stage?

Just imagine the prospect: here is a purely speculative entry list for the 2022 Le Mans 24 hour race:

Prototypes:		GT Cars:
Rebellion-Oreca		Audi
Courage-Peugeot		Aston Martin
Strakka-Dome		Bentley
Ligier		Porsche
Alpine		Lamborghini
Gibson		McLaren
Oreca		Ford GT
Kolles-Lotus		BMW
Manor		Mercedes
Mazda		Nissan
Riley		Jaguar
GM-Corvette		Ferrari
Ginetta		TVR
HPD-Honda

Inevitably, I fear, there would be debate about whether manufacturer teams should be allowed in the Prototype class. My suggestion would be that it should be restricted to private entries, but that becomes a difficult definition to regulate, especially when things as important as Le Mans victories are concerned. But then Le Mans’ history is littered with examples of works entries masquerading as privateers (as 1995 and 1996 show), so maybe we shouldn’t get too precious about this.

There is also the whole matter of crew composition, amateur drivers and grading, which I have deliberately avoided. Despite my misgivings, there are quite simply not enough world-class drivers available to crew fifty or sixty cars with three drivers per car – so non-professional drivers will inevitably be part of endurance racing for many years to come. Rightly so, for herein lies a good deal of the attraction of the place and the event.

The important aspect of this vision is that while the concept of multi-class racing has been key to the success of endurance racing over the years, it may be that – just as in the world of touring cars – equalising the top of some classes might have some benefit.

What do you think? Am I barking mad?

Dubai, Daytona and Bathurst... oh, and Monza!

I often seem to find myself apologising for not posting more on this blog, but regular readers – if there are any left – will know that my priorities lie elsewhere than posting idle chatter here.

Having been fortunate enough to spend a very enjoyable time in Dubai commentating for radiolemans.com for the Hankook-sponsored 24-hour race, I dug into the data and posted an analysis of that race on dailysportscar.com. And although I did not travel to either Daytona for the Rolex 24-hour race or to Bathurst for the Liqui-Moly 12 hours, I was able to get hold of similar amounts of data for each of those races, from which I could provide further articles for dailysportscar. Writing anything here then seemed a little superfluous – or else too much like hard work! But I was then inspired by the “GT Debate” on Midweek Motorsport to ponder further on the wisdom of having three races in a four-week period on three different continents (none of them Europe). However, the fact that only two drivers participated in all three is perhaps a good indication that there is sufficient interest across the world for such an intense start to the season.

Whilst the sixty hours of racing certainly meant a hectic travel schedule for some, the internet and live streaming provided the opportunity for others – and I was one of them – to observe the unfolding of events from the comfort of their homes. Those who did stay up witnessed some first-class racing and excellent entertainment.

Helped by the benefit of hindsight, not to mention a fair old distance, I thought I would see what lessons we might be able to draw by stepping back and looking at all three races together. A “long view from afar”, if you see what I mean.

For the purposes of comparing like with like (more or less), and sticking to the principle of looking only at GT3 racing, I am only going to consider the A6 (Pro and Am) class from Dubai, the GTD class from Daytona and class A (AP and AA) at Bathurst.

First, a reminder of the top six from each race.

Pos.	Dubai	Daytona	Bathurst
1	Audi (WRT)	Audi (Magnus)	McLaren
2	Mercedes(Blk Falcon)	Porsche	Nissan
3	Audi (ABT)	Dodge Viper	Bentley Continental
4	Mercedes (Hofor)	Aston Martin	Audi (Phoenix)
5	Audi (Optimum)	Lamborghini	Mercedes (Erebus)
6	Mercedes (PreciSpark)	BMW	Audi (GT)

I’m not really sure what conclusions to draw from this, since each race had very different entries, but if one were to award a “cup” for the best manufacturer, you’d have to work hard to convince me that it shouldn’t be presented to Audi, closely followed by Mercedes.

But spare a moment to look at the list of manufacturers that is represented in that list of top six finishers… ten altogether. Then notice that Ferrari isn’t even on the list!

All three races run to rather different regulations, and on rather different types of track, but nevertheless, I thought it would be fun to compare the total distance achieved by the winners in each race. To make matters fair, I have multiplied the winner’s distance at Bathurst by two, as it was only a twelve-hour race!

	Dubai	Daytona	Bathurst *2
Distance km	3,174.6	4,027.7	3,690.6
Distance miles	1,972.6	2,502.7	2,293.2
Percentage	78.8%	100%	91.6%

The final row shows each distance as a percentage of the distance covered at Daytona. (Note that this is the race distance achieved by the class-winning Magnus Audi, not the ESM Ligier-HPD of the overall winners. The ESM team completed 736 laps in the 24 hours, a distance of 4,216.7 km, or 104.7% of the distance covered by the leading GTD car.)

One of the things that makes endurance racing so fascinating is that there are so many elements to success. In addition to having a fast car, you need to have a crew of drivers who can work together, you need to be efficient in the pits, and you need the car to be reliable. Not surprisingly, the way that the regulations work on pit stops is different in each race, but nevertheless, it is interesting to compare the total time spent in the pits by the winning car in each of the three races:

Dubai: 1h 23m 20s (25 stops, 4 drivers, 17 changes of driver)
Daytona: 40m 58s (28 stops, 4 drivers, 11 changes of driver)
Bathurst: 18m 32.371 (13 stops, 3 drivers, 5 changes of driver)

More than anything else, this really just goes to show the difference in fuelling regulations – Dubai using the separate refuelling area, and Daytona stipulating a slower refuelling rate in order separate the GT-LM cars from the GTD entries. What it does demonstrate is that to win any of these races you need to have a fault-free run… but of course, at Bathurst, the winning McLaren’s run was anything but perfect: the Nissan that finished 1.276s behind stopped 11 times for 13m 54s and the fourth-placed Audi made only 8 stops, spent only 11m 09s in the pit lane and still finished on the lead lap!

But while not stopping (for too long) is important, motor-racing is supposed to be all about speed, isn’t it? So let’s just check out the fastest lap times around each circuit: ultimately, it should be that which plays the largest part in defining which of the races goes the furthest.

Speed of fastest lap:
Dubai: 1m 58.712s (163.727 km/h) – 84.0%
Daytona: 1m 45.873s (194.812 km/h) – 100%
Bathurst: 2m 01.567s (183.987 km/h) – 94.4%

It is not just setting a fast lap time, though. Most people reading this know that I will go to my grave bleating about average lap times, but one means of calculating this for the whole race (a method that I seldom use, I must admit) is to take the distance covered and divide it by the total time spent on the track (as opposed to being in the pits).

This give the following - call it the winner’s average speed on track:
Dubai: 139.28 km/h (80.7%)
Daytona: 172.50 km/h (100%)
Bathurst: 157.59 km/h (91.4%)

But rather than measuring the speed on the track, this is actually measuring the amount of time that the race is neutralised: either by the dreaded Safety Car, or – in the case of Dubai – of the Code-60 periods.

So how long was each race under full course caution? In the table below, don’t forget that Bathurst is only 12 hours. Here are the details of the Race Neutralisations at each event:

Dubai: 4h 20m 09s (18% of race) / 545 laps green (93% of race laps)
Daytona: 5h 10m 52s (22%) / 593 laps green (84% of race laps)
Bathurst: 3h 04m 31s (26%) / 245 laps green (82% of race laps)

It is interesting – but also obvious, when you think about it – that the percentage of race laps lost is different from the percentage of time spent under caution. At Dubai the average speed under caution is 60km/h, at Bathurst around 90km/h and about 120km/h at Daytona behind a Safety Car.

There is a strong argument that we now have a golden era for GT racing, worldwide. The last time that it was so popular was probably in the early 1990’s when prototype racing self-destructed and GTs – led by the BPR Organisation – were the only game in town. But perhaps more momentous were the Group 5 GT cars of the late 1970’s: when ‘silhouette-style’ racers were produced by specialists, but prompted by factory support from Ford, BMW, Lancia and Porsche. Then, as now, major manufacturers saw the benefit of racing to improve the image of the breed.

It also gives me an excuse to dig out some photos from my collection: stirring stuff, don’t you agree? I wish I had taken my camera to more race meetings - somehow it was just a bit too much clutter - otherwise there would certainly be a Zakspeed Capri here...

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In closing, let me offer you a somewhat whimsical thought on those first three races of the year. With 98 cars taking the start in Dubai, 54 at Daytona and 36 in Bathurst an awful lot of competitive miles were covered in the sixty hours that comprised those races.

Total distance covered:
Dubai: 232,556km
Daytona: 186,018km
Bathurst: 46,349km
Total: 464,924km

To try and put that number into perspective, consider that the moon is, on average, 384,400km away from the Earth. Or that the circumference of Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system, is 439,264km. The competitors in the first three races of the year, went – in total – further than either of those!