EVENT PREVIEW: Second Half of Season Gets Underway at Paul Ricard

The second half of the twelve round FIA GT3 European Championship begins this weekend at Paul Ricard. The championship first visited the circuit at Le Castellet in 2009 and the challenging track quickly became a firm favourite with the teams and drivers.   With large grids, representing 10 different marques, the FIA GT3 European Championship continues to provide action-packed racing on the top European race circuits. 

After six races in the UK, Czech Republic and Spain, Christian Hohenadel and Daniel Keilwitz hold the upper hand in the driver’s championship with a comfortable 31 point lead over their nearest rivals, while their Callaway Competition team hold a slightly smaller 8 point advantage in the team championship.   With two races this weekend, and a maximum of 50 points available for two wins, the championship is far from decided as we look forward to the next six races in France, Portugal and Belgium.

In the first four races Corvette was the dominant winning three of the first four races and filling five of the six podium places in Rounds 3 and 4 at Brno. However this situation changed in the last two rounds at Jarama in Spain two weeks ago. 

While the Corvette was still on the pace on the tight twists and turns of the Spanish circuit, the two race victories went to the Saintloc-Phoenix Racing Audi R8 LMS of Belgian drivers Greg Franchi and Stephane Lemeret and a debut victory in European competition for the BMW Z4 run by Need for Speed by Schubert Motorsport and driven by Claudia Hürtgen and Csaba Walter after a race long battle with the Prospeed Competition Porsche 911 GT3R of Marco Holzer and Paul van Splunteren.  The win for the BMW also marked the first for Dunlop and the two drivers became the first female and Hungarian drivers respectively to stand on the top step of the GT3 podium in five years of competition.

Reigning French GT3 Champion Mike Parisy and his co driver Joakim Lambotte won both races in the Czech Republic in May in the Graff Racing Corvette Z06R but technical problems in Spain meant they only scored one championship point and will be looking to return to winning ways at their home race here at Paul Ricard.  Another French Corvette driver who will be looking for a good result this weekend is former race winner Dino Lunardi.  Podium finishes at Silverstone and Brno with co-driver and team owner Toni Seiler has given the brand new Toni Seiler Racing team an encouraging start to the season but they failed to score any points in Spain, a situation that Lunardi hopes to change in his home country.

The Hexis AMR team are running Aston Martins in both the FIA GT1 World and the FIA GT3 European Championships and the French team are hoping for better luck this weekend after a disappointing trip to Spain last month.  Frédéric Makowiecki is racing in both championships and he and Manuel Rodrigues took the team’s only GT3 podium finish at Silverstone in May.  Their team mates Luc Paillard and Thomas Accary have scored two points finishes this year so far but will be hoping for a podium finish on the track that Accary won on last year.

The Chad Racing Ferrari 430 Scuderia of Diego Alessi and Giacomo Petrobelli took its first podium finish in Spain but the car has been on the pace since the start of the season and the British team will be looking for an even better result this weekend.

Who will be victorious in France? Can the Corvettes return to winning ways or will one of the other marques join Corvette, Porsche Audi and BMW as race winners in 2010?  The podium finishing cars in Jarama have to carry success ballast in the next two races.  The nr3 Audi R8 LMS and the nr77 BMW Z4 will both have 20kg for winning Rounds 5 & 6 respectively. The nr61 Porsche and the nr101 Corvette will carry 15kg and the nr87 Ferrari and the nr6 Audi 10kg.

For the latest information visit the championship website at GT3Europe.com where you can also watch the remaining races of the 2010 season live. 

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