The inaugural season for the Protyre Motorsport Ginetta GT Championship continues this weekend (27/28 May) at Donington Park with Luke Reade aiming to continue a stunning 100% winning record so far.
The new championship for 2023 combines Ginetta’s latest manufacturing offering, the G56 GT Pro car, with the always entertaining G40 GT5 racers to produce a packed grid of talented drivers serving up fantastic action.
Reade (Wolf Motorsport) is targeting a second consecutive Ginetta title this year after his 2022 GT4 SuperCup ‘G55 Pro’ success, and has enjoyed a dream start to the season after adding a victory last time out at Silverstone to a clean sweep of the wins across the Oulton Park season opener.
Reade has by no means had it all his own way at the front of the field though, with a number of drivers having challenged him for top honours so far. Callum Davies (SVG Motorsport) has enjoyed a stunning start to his debut car-racing campaign, finishing third in every race so far.
Ginetta GT5 Challenge graduate Ruben Hage set the pace in qualifying at Silverstone and has featured on the podium at both events so far, while his Breakell Racing team-mate and GT4 SuperCup alumni Carl Garnett twice finished second to Reade at Oulton Park and joins Hage in targeting a breakthrough overall Ginetta race win.
Two more former GT4 SuperCup racers are ones to watch, Conner Garlick (Xentek Motorsport) and Colin White (4×4). Garlick picked up a best result so far of fourth last time out and has clear podium potential, while White has finished in the top six twice already as he continues his inspirational return to racing after sustaining critical injuries in an incident at Thruxton last year.
The competitive GT Pro class is completing by the ever-improving Liona Theobald (SVG Motorsport), who had made the big step up from the Junior Championship for 2023, and Ginetta veteran Shawn Fleming (SF Racing).
The GT5 Pro category for those drivers in the G40 GT5 machinery has already had its fair share of twists and turns across the four races to date. Luke Garlick leads the way for reigning champions Xentek Motorsport, having picked up a second victory so far at Silverstone.
Ella Lloyd picked up the other two wins on offer in dominant fashion at Oulton Park and will be aiming to close the gap at the top of the standings this weekend, while fellow Xentek racer Sam Harvey showed his race-winning potential with a podium treble at Oulton Park. Long-time GT5 Am front-runner Karim Sekkat (Breakell Racing) and Lexie Belk (Privateer) will hope to be in the mix for silverware too.
This year’s GT5 Am battle has been a duel between Bal Sidhu (Xentek Motorsport) and Pablo Jequier (Race Car Consultants) so far. The more experienced Sidhu has had the upper hand with four wins out of four, however Jequier has shown he’s capable of challenging for top spot.
Weekend Timetable:
Saturday 27 May – Qualifying, 09:10; Race One, 14:50
Sunday 28 May – Race Two, 11:40; Race Three, 17:00
All three races will be streamed live on Ginetta’s YouTube channel and Facebook page, while live timing and results will be available here: www.tsl-timing.com/event/232105
Follow the action across the weekend on social media, @GinettaCars.
