Following a thrilling debut at Oulton Park, the 2023 Protyre Motorsport Ginetta GT Championship is ready to put on a show this weekend at Silverstone.
The new championship for 2023 combines Ginetta’s latest manufacturing offering, the G56 GT Pro car, with the always entertaining G40 GT5 racers. It’s sure to produce a packed grid of talented drivers serving up fantastic action.
The inaugural weekend for the championship was dominated by Luke Reade (Wolf Motorsport). He had a perfect hat-trick of race wins kick-starting his efforts to secure back-to-back Ginetta titles. This if off the back of having won the G55 Pro class in the GT4 SuperCup last year.
Fellow GT4 alumni Carl Garnett (Breakell Racing) was Reade’s closest challenger in the Oulton opener with a pair of second place finishes on his return to racing after a year away. Callum Davies (SVG Motorsport) hugely impressed with a podium treble in his debut car-racing weekend.
The new GTP class has attracted drivers from across Ginetta’s racing ladder. Podium-finisher Ruben Hage (Breakell Racing), Liona Theobald (SVG Motorsport) and Conner Garlick (Xentek Motorsport) entering the series from the GT5 Challenge, Juniors and GT4 SuperCup respectively.
A couple of hugely experienced Ginetta drivers have joined the grid too. Four-time GT4 SuperCup class champion Colin White (CWS 4×4) making an inspirational return to racing. Shawn Fleming (SF Racing) has entered his tenth season of Ginetta racing.
In the GT5 Challenge, reigning champions Xentek Motorsport enjoyed a dream start to their Pro class title defence. They had a clean sweep of the opening race wins. Ella Lloyd took two of those, with a dominant display seeing her win the class by margins of 16 and 18 seconds.
The other victory went the way of Luke Garlick, with both he and team-mate Sam Harvey picking up podium hat-tricks at Oulton Park. The other podium went the way of Karim Sekkat (Breakell Racing). He stepped up to the Pro class after three years in the Am ranks.
Lexie Belk (Alastair Rushforth Motorsport) is targeting a podium breakthrough this weekend. The 2021 series front-runner Will Rochford (TCR) makes a welcome return to the grid. In GT5 Am, Bal Sidhu (Xentek Motorsport) has the early advantage after taking all three wins ahead of Pablo Jequier (Race Car Consultants).
Follow the action across the weekend on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Weekend Timetable:
Saturday 06 May – Qualifying, 11:40; Race One, 17:35
Sunday 07 May – Race Two, 10:34
Both races will be streamed live on Ginetta’s YouTube channel and Facebook page. Live timing and results will be available here: https://www.tsl-timing.com/event/231805
