Indholdsfortegnelse for 26/10/23 i Autosport

Alain Prost (in 1993), Michael Schumacher (2001), Lewis Hamilton (2016), Sebastian Vettel (2018), and now Max Verstappen. Red Bull’s current star underlined his status as one of the Formula 1 greats by joining the short list of drivers to score his 50th world championship grand prix victory at Austin last weekend. Many of Verstappen’s recent successes have not exactly pushed the Dutchman to dig deep, such has been the advantage of the RB19, but the United States Grand Prix was different. As Alex Kalinauckas explains on page 18, a combination of a track limits penalty, Red Bull brake problems, improved performance from McLaren and Mercedes, and an inspired Hamilton made Verstappen’s job more challenging than anyone expected on Sunday. In the end, Hamilton’s disqualification (see p4) made the battle academic,…

WEC Mick Schumacher got his first taste of a sportscar last week when he drove the new Alpine A424 LMDh prototype at Jerez. The tryout came after a way for him continue in his role as Mercedes Formula 1 test and reserve alongside another programme was outlined by team boss Toto Wolff last month. Wolff was responding to speculation that Schumacher was in talks with the Renault brand about joining its World Endurance Championship assault with the Signatech team in 2024. The German was known to have had talks with Alpine boss Bruno Famin. Alpine has confirmed that Schumacher did drive the A424, but has revealed few other details. Signatech boss Philippe Sinault simply described it as a “first contact” and a “short programme” as he sampled a prototype. The…

FIA Formula 3 podium finisher Luke Browning had his first taste of F1 machinery on the Silverstone Grand Prix circuit on Tuesday as his prize for winning the 2022 Aston Martin Autosport BRDC Award. The 21-year-old Williams junior drove the Aston Martin AMR21 on the drying circuit, heading out first on wet-weather tyres before swapping to a hard-compound Pirelli slick. “It’s a lot quicker through the low speed than I expected,” he said after his installation lap. “I’m really looking forward to unleashing it through Copse once it dries up a little bit – that’s going to be the really exciting part, so that’s what I’m looking forward to. Everything is incredible – the ride, the power steering – and I’m really looking forward to smashing the brakes later on.”…

BTCC British Touring Car Championship ringmaster Alan Gow is known to be partial to a spot of IndyCar action, and his teams have gone along with a plan to implement a new qualifying system for 2024 entirely based on the US series’ format used for road and street courses. From now on, the field will be split into two groups, based on alternate positions from the second free practice session, for the first phase. The top six from each will graduate to the next round, with the top half-dozen from this 12 fighting it out for pole among the ‘Quick Six’. Each session will last for 10 minutes. “I’ve long admired the way IndyCar use this system – it’s ideal for the BTCC and in keeping with our policy of…

WEC Lexus is set to race in the new LMGT3 class of the World Endurance Championship next year with the French Auto Sport Promotion team. It has announced that it will be filing entries for what is likely to be an oversubscribed category, and began its test programme with the Toyota marque’s RC F GT3 at the Algarve Circuit this week. ASP, run by 13-time Le Mans 24 Hours participant Jerome Policand and a multiple title winner in the GT World Challenge Europe with Mercedes, is taking up the entries earmarked for Lexus. It is expanding an existing partnership with Toyota that already encompasses the GR Supra GT4, one expected to continue when the Japanese manufacturer’s new contender based on the GR GT3 Concept enters competition in 2025. Present at…

FIA GT WORLD CUP Every former winner of the FIA GT World Cup will be on the grid for the resumption of the event on the streets of Macau next month. Maro Engel, Laurens Vanthoor, Edoardo Mortara, Augusto Farfus and Raffaele Marciello are among the 21-car entry in factory-backed GT3 machinery for its first edition since 2019. Both Marciello and Engel will race in Macau on 18-19 November as defending champions: the Italian won the last time the World Cup took place in 2019 before it was a casualty of the COVID pandemic and travel restrictions into the Chinese territory; the German, the inaugural winner of the title in 2015, took victory in the non-FIA GT race at Macau last year. Marciello drives for the Landgraf Mercedes team with which…

The most interesting aspect of the Austin sprint race was eventual winner Max Verstappen’s ultra-aggressive chop on Charles Leclerc heading up the hill to the first turn. The pair were sharing the front row and launched in unison, but Leclerc gained ground in the second phase of the start and pulled his front axle level with Verstappen’s left-rear, at which point the Dutchman veered left to cut off the Ferrari’s line. Leclerc, who felt the move was “on the limit” but “would have done exactly the same”, was sent across the pitlane exit to the edge of the grass. At the Turn 1 hairpin, Leclerc was pinched, which allowed Lewis Hamilton – who started third and saw off Lando Norris under braking for the left-hander – to get a run.…

Charles Leclerc’s disqualification from the United States GP added to his unhappiness following an ill-advised one-stop strategy. After starting from pole, he was asked to move aside for team-mate Carlos Sainz late on as Ferrari elected to diverge its run plans with the two drivers, and Leclerc’s one-stop efforts could not prevent Sainz and Sergio Perez from moving past in the latter stages of the race. It proved to be the wrong strategy, and other teams who had committed to it made U-turns during the race. The disqualification that Leclerc was slapped with after a barely conciliatory sixth-place finish will have smarted even more, but he had already revealed his displeasure at being lumped with a one-stop approach. “There was something wrong in our numbers today, because we were far…

EUROPEAN LE MANS SERIES ALGARVE CIRCUIT (PRT) 20/22 OCTOBER ROUNDS 5/6 & 6/6 Algarve Pro Racing trio Alex Lynn, Kyffin Simpson and James Allen secured the European Le Mans Series title with a pair of second-place finishes across a Portimao double-header finale in which United Autosports won both races amid adverse weather conditions. The unorthodox season conclusion, featuring two four-hour races, stemmed from the cancellation of May’s 4 Hours of Imola. Instead, the ELMS organisers added a second round – the 4 Hours of Algarve – to its final fixture and named the weekend the ‘Portimao Grand Season Finale’. The opening race kicked off on Friday afternoon before running into the early evening. United had appeared to be on the back foot following the final round of fuel stops, before…

NASCAR CUP HOMESTEAD (USA) 22 OCTOBER ROUND 34/36 Christopher Bell is getting good at pulling off dramatic wins to earn NASCAR Cup championship opportunities. Bell claimed two ‘must-win’ races in the playoffs last year to advance to the Cup series title race and, in almost the same situation last Sunday, he rallied in the final 60 laps to hold off Ryan Blaney for an improbable victory at Homestead. Bell struggled for much of the race in his Joe Gibbs Racing Toyota and at one point nearly fell a lap down. But a string of caution-causing incidents as the 267 laps wore down knocked several playoff contenders out of the race and put Bell back in the hunt for the win. Bell grabbed the lead for the first time on a…

From the moment Louis Sharp burst onto the British Formula 4 scene last year, he has been turning heads with his performances. After travelling over from New Zealand, he completed far fewer test days than his rivals yet was instantly on the pace of his Carlin stablemates. And, despite being too young to contest the opener, he was in the mix at the second event, taking a podium at Brands Hatch. Fast forward 12 months and Sharp was back for another crack and, after finishing fourth in 2022, he was in the spotlight again – this time as the highest-placed driver staying in F4. “There’s always pressure whether it’s your first year or second,” he says. “But there was probably more pressure on me than some of the others. As…

The 10-week gap between the second and third events of the Porsche Sprint Challenge GB season gave plenty of time to reflect. And Ginetta Junior graduate Joe Warhurst wanted to use the hiatus to turn his season around after battling to podiums on his first wet-weather running in the Cayman at Donington Park before struggling in Snetterton qualifying and then suffering a track-limits penalty when pushing too hard at Hamilton. “I knew, if we continued this way, I wasn’t going to win the championship and I needed to do something about it,” recalls Warhurst. “I spent a lot of time with Team Parker trying to look at everything that went wrong and why it went wrong.” And that hard work yielded results as he qualified on pole at Croft and…

BRITISH GT Century Motorsport owner Nathan Freke would “love to” keep his British GT titlewinning pairing of Dan Harper and Darren Leung together into the 2024 season. The BMW duo came out on top in a rollercoaster ride of a race at the Donington finale last Sunday, overcoming a 20-second success penalty in the pits to finish second. After describing the season as “a dream year”, Freke added, when asked if he would try to keep the combination together to defend the crown: “Love to, I’d absolutely love to. Darren’s quite new to his career and has obviously got big hopes and big goals going forwards. “I can’t talk for Darren but, from the conversations I’ve had, I think the ambition is to do British GT. One thing that is…

CIVIC CUP The Civic Cup is introducing an off-the-shelf build kit for the FN2-model Honda Civic Type R to encourage more of the cars into the series. The EP3 model, built between 2001 and 2005, has been numerically dominant in the championship, with only a handful of the newer FN2s, dating from 2007-11. The FN2’s greater weight and simpler torsion beam axle, compared with the EP3’s double wishbone set-up, have contributed to it being less favourable. But championship promoter Maximum Motorsport has conducted development work on the FN2 this year to address its potential flaws. “There’s a lot of EP3s out there but they’re getting harder to find,” explained Maximum boss Stewart Lines. “There’s been some FN2s in the championship, but they haven’t been stellar on performance. So we’ve had…

EQUIPE CLASSIC RACING Equipe Classic Racing will run single-seater races for the first time next year after launching a new Equipe F2 Atlantic series. The organiser has traditionally hosted contests for pre-1966 sportscars before beginning to diversify with the creation last season of its Equipe 70s category, which features tin-tops alongside GTs. Now, with BCV8s and the more modern machinery of the MG Cup arriving on board for 2024, it is also expanding into historic single-seaters in the belief that there is a gap in the market for a UK-focused series for Formula 2 and Formula Atlantic cars. “We felt we needed to change the profile of what we’re doing and we know some people in that arena,” said Equipe partner Rob Cull. “What we’ve looked at is F2/Formula Atlantic…

DONINGTON PARK BRITISH GT 22 OCTOBER Dan Harper and Darren Leung secured the British GT3 title after finishing second in a chaotic Donington Park decider. The Century Motorsport-run BMW M4 crew arrived at the season finale trailing championship leader James Cottingham, and the absent Jonny Adam, by 13 points following their victory last time out at Brands Hatch. However, there was drama even before the race as seven grid penalties and four disqualifications were handed out on Saturday night after qualifying, including the removal of the pole-winning Beechdean-run Aston Martin of Andrew Howard and Ross Gunn for failing to set two timed laps in the opening wet Q1 session. The sanction was later overturned, however, after Pirelli confirmed an unexpected tyre issue was to blame for an early pitstop. This…

DONINGTON PARK GB3 21-22 OCTOBER Rodin Carlin driver Callum Voisin produced his best performance of the season to clinch the GB3 title at the Donington Park season finale. Five drivers remained in contention for the crown entering the final round, with Voisin holding a slender 13-point advantage over fellow 2023 Aston Martin Autosport BRDC Young Driver finalist Joseph Loake, with Hitech GP’s Alex Dunne only four points further adrift. Voisin boosted his hopes further by topping a wet qualifying session to claim his fifth and sixth poles of the season, securing the Jack Cavill Pole Position Cup for the second year in a row in the process. Voisin made good use of his starting position in race one to score his second victory of 2023 in a disrupted encounter. JHR…

BRANDS HATCH BRSCC FORMULA FORD FESTIVAL 21-22 OCTOBER It was a tantalising prospect. Three previous winners of the Formula Ford Festival lining up in the first three places on the grid for last weekend’s final at Brands Hatch promised an exciting contest. Each of Rory Smith (2020 victor), Jamie Sharp (2021) and Niall Murray (2013 and 2016) were feeling confident of scoring more success after strong semi-final showings. Add in 2021 National champion Chris Middlehurst and two-time Combe title winner Luke Cooper starting just behind and all the ingredients were in place for a classic. And the 2023 final proved exactly that. Right from the start, no inch was given with the leading trio circulating as one – and that set the tone for a frantic 20 laps in the…

FORMULA FORD FESTIVAL Heat 1 Luke Cooper (Swift SC20) Heat 2 Nolan Allaer (Ray GR22) Heat 3 Jamie Sharp (Medina JL17) Semi-final 1 Jamie Sharp (Medina JL17) Semi-final 2 Rory Smith (Medina JL18) Last Chance race Nolan Allaer (Ray GR22) Historic final Richard Higgins (Van Diemen RF91, above) Final (20 laps) 1 Rory Smith (Medina JL18); 2 Jamie Sharp (Medina JL17) +0.372s; 3 Chris Middlehurst (Van Diemen LA10); 4 Luke Cooper (Swift SC20); 5 Jordan Dempsey (Van Diemen RF00); 6 Jordan Kelly (Van Diemen RF06). Fastest lap Niall Murray (RF99) 50.067s (86.85mph). Pole Smith. Starters 30. TCR UK Race 1 Alex Ley (Hyundai i30 N) Race 2 Jac Constable (Audi RS3 LMS) FIESTA JUNIOR Races 1 & 2 Jacob Hodgkiss (Mk7, above) MINI 7 WINTER SERIES Races 1, 2 &…

HRDC GERRY MARSHALL TROPHY Fred Shepherd (Ford Boss Mustang 302) MRL PALL MALL CUP Oliver Reuben/Harry Barton (TVR 200 Griffith) HRDC ALLSTARS WITH CLASSIC ALFAS John Davison (TVR Griffith) HRDC JACK SEARS TROPHY John Davison (Ford Mustang) MRL WOODCOTE TROPHY & STIRLING MOSS TROPHY Andrew Smith (Cooper Monaco, below) MRL HISTORIC TOURING CAR CHALLENGE Darren Fielding (BMW E30 M3) MRL JAGUAR CLASSIC CHALLENGE Graeme Dodd/James Dodd (E-type) GT4 CHALLENGE Alex Osborne (Ginetta G55) For full results visit: tsl-timing.com…

Sebring International Raceway’s 3.741 miles of bumpy asphalt is unique. And in choosing it as his favourite track, Oliver Gavin makes several references to the airfield venue’s one-of-a-kind nature that, in his estimation, narrowly elevates it above the Circuit de la Sarthe where he took five Le Mans 24 Hours class victories. Gavin raced at Sebring every year from 2001-20, winning on his first visit to the track in a Konrad Saleen S7-R. As the scene of the first and last victories of his 18-year stint with Corvette Racing, Sebring proved a happy hunting ground. The Briton was a Sebring 12 Hours class winner on six occasions, and also triumphed in July 2020 when it staged the first IMSA SportsCar Championship round after the COVID hiatus. That 51st victory with…

FORMULA 1 Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc were disqualified from last Sunday’s United States Grand Prix after their cars were found to have finished the race with excessively worn floor planks. The FIA technical regulations decree that the 10mm skids must measure no less than 9mm in thickness come scrutineering. But the Mercedes of runner-up Hamilton and sixth-placed Leclerc’s Ferrari were picked for checks – alongside Max Verstappen’s Red Bull and the McLaren of Lando Norris – and were found to be non-compliant. FIA technical delegate Jo Bauer can carry out “at his discretion, any checks to verify the compliance of the cars entered in the competition”. As such, scrutineering isn’t uniform. No one had their floors inspected after last month’s Japanese GP, but three were assessed next time out…

FORMULA 1 The FIA has hiked the maximum fine that it can dish out to Formula 1 teams and drivers up €1,000,000. The governing body reasons that the previous €250,000 limit outlined in the International Sporting Code had “not been reviewed nor amended for at least the last 12 years and does not reflect the current needs of motorsport”. Other FIA world championship competitors (Rally, Endurance, Rallycross, Rally-Raid, Formula E) may one day have to cough up to €750,000. These sums will be reinvested in grassroots motorsport. While the increase reflects the growth of F1 since 2011, with teams now valued at $1billion, the paddock is incensed. They have called out the lack of warning and consultation, there not being any codified list detailing which sins will cop the eye-watering…

Britons Louis Foster and Jamie Chadwick will both remain with the renamed Andretti Global team for a second season of Indy NXT in 2024. Foster took two wins on his way to fourth in this year’s points, while Chadwick claimed 12th position. Both took part in last week’s official test at Indianapolis (Chadwick pictured). Among the other IndyCar support series in action at the test, Adam Fitzgerald sampled a USF Pro 2000 car with TJ Speed Motorsports. The Irishman has recovered from the injuries he sustained in the tragic Formula Regional European crash at Spa in July that claimed the life of Dilano van’t Hoff.…

MACAU GRAND PRIX Richard Verschoor is stepping back from Formula 2 in an attempt to become the fifth driver to become a two-time winner of the Macau Grand Prix in its Formula 3 era. The 22-year-old Dutchman tops the 27-car entry list for next month’s race, four years on from F3’s last appearance before travel restrictions from the COVID crisis scuppered any possibility of assembling an international field. Verschoor won that event in 2019 with MP Motorsport on his and the team’s Macau debut (above). Verschoor has been a race winner in F2 this year with Van Amersfoort Racing, but has returned to Trident – with which he took an F2 victory in 2022 – for Macau. “Many people advised me not to do it, but I like a challenge,”…

UK START TIMES Friday 27 October FP1 1930 FP2 2300 Saturday 28 October FP3 1830 QUALIFYING 2200 Sunday 29 October RACE 2000 CATCH THE RACE LIVE SKY SPORTS F1 BBC RADIO 5 LIVE TV Highlights CHANNEL 4 0100 (Monday) TYRE ALLOCATION CHAMPIONSHIP POSITIONS Drivers Constructors MEXICO CITY STATS Previous winners 2022 POLE POSITION Max Verstappen 1m17.775s POLE LAP RECORD Daniel Ricciardo 1m14.759s (2018) RACE LAP RECORD Valtteri Bottas 1m17.774s (2021) Laps led…

After a lifeless first sprint race at Austin, the 2023 United States Grand Prix gave the weekend a cracking ending even though the result of both was the same: a Max Verstappen victory. His GP triumph at the Circuit of The Americas was his 50th in Formula 1. But had things worked out only slightly differently, Verstappen’s completion of the half-century could well have extended to the upcoming Mexican GP. Indeed, it could well have been Mercedes’ Lewis Hamilton standing atop an F1 podium for the first time since the Saudi Arabian GP in December 2021. Things went wrong for Hamilton right at the beginning, when frontrow starters Charles Leclerc and Lando Norris had very different getaways. Norris was quickly alongside the Ferrari and at Turn 1 the McLaren was…

If you want to see quite how stiffly sprung the current generation of Formula 1 cars truly are, you could do little better than pay a visit up the towering hill at Austin’s opening corner. Autosport, having marched up that climb in the fierce 35C heat sans water bottle in what can only be described as an utterly foolish move, has only just made it. But we’re in for a treat for our efforts. Having climbed a photographers’ tower looking across the gigantic run-off area behind Turn 1, and with the start/finish straight stretching down before us, downtown Austin basking in the background to our right, we can see how much the track’s famed bumps unsettle these machines. The Ferraris, in particular, are very stiffly sprung early on – the…

F1 ACADEMY AUSTIN (USA) 21-22 OCTOBER ROUND 7/7 Marta Garcia became yet another driver to win a championship in a Prema Racing-run Formula 4 car when she triumphed in the opening race of F1 Academy’s season finale to its inaugural season, supporting the US Grand Prix. The Spaniard claimed pole position and took the lead at the start, but had to endure some side-by-side battling with Abbi Pulling on the opening lap. Rodin Carlin driver Pulling kept the pressure on Garcia all the way to the finish. There was a fight behind too, with ART Grand Prix’s Lena Buhler getting past Nerea Marti to claim third position. Contact with Jessica Edgar on the opening lap damaged Garcia’s front wing in the reversed-grid second race, and a black-and-orange flag forced her…

MOTOGP PHILLIP ISLAND (AUS) 21 OCTOBER ROUND 16/20 It was getting to a point where you had to wonder whether Johann Zarco would ever actually win a grand prix. And there are a fair few people within the MotoGP paddock who believed his time had come and gone. After coming close on a Tech3 Yamaha on several occasions in 2017 and 2018, and his hellishly brief stint with KTM in 2019, Zarco landed on his feet in 2020 when Ducati offered him a career reprieve. But being on the grid’s best bike for the past three and a bit seasons still wasn’t proving enough to break his duck. And his looming move to LCR will give him a Honda that, for now at least, does not a race winner make.…

If there was a BTCC trophy for bad luck, it likely would have gone in 2023 to Dan Cammish. Lest we forget, this is the guy who in 2019, his second season in the series, came within a few miles of winning the title. This year he was a distant sixth, with less than 57% of team-mate Ash Sutton’s points total. You can partly pin the blame on Cammish himself for what happened at Knockhill; he was quickest at the time when he fell off the road during qualifying on a wet-but-drying track, a bump tore off the radiator and he plummeted to 23rd. Not so for next time out at Donington; he was flying in free practice, easily top of the times, when brake failure at McLeans caused a…

There was only ever one goal for Adam Smalley in the Porsche Carrera Cup GB this year. After finishing runner-up last season, he was determined to follow in his previous four Juniors’ footsteps and claim the crown. No pressure then. But, after a strong start, winning the title never truly looked to be in much doubt. Smalley laid down a marker by qualifying on pole for the Donington Park opener and, although he slipped to second in the first race, he stormed from fourth to the lead on the opening lap of the reversed-grid contest to signal he meant business. Having switched from Redline Racing to Team Parker during the off-season, Smalley credits competing in the winter Porsche Sprint Challenge Southern Europe series as being key to his impressive start.…

BRITISH GT Former W Series driver Abbie Eaton has expressed her desire to make a full-time return to British GT after a cameo appearance at the 2023 finale at Donington Park. The 31-year-old failed to complete a racing lap on Sunday after team-mate John Seale crashed the Fox Motorsport Lamborghini Huracan GT3 they were due to share into the barriers at the Old Hairpin during the opening stint. Eaton finished fourth in the GT4 standings in 2016 in an Ebor Maserati and has been regularly racing Lamborghinis this season. “I always wanted to come back, I never wanted to leave, but it’s just an opportunity I was lucky to have with John,” she said. “I’ve been lucky to race in Super Trofeo this year, which is a GT3 car of…

CCRC Castle Combe Racing Club’s popular Hot Hatch competition is to be run as a fully fledged championship next year, following seven successful seasons as a series of events. “We have been thinking about it for a few years, but kept thinking if it’s successful, why change it?” said CCRC chair Ken Davies. “But, when we put it to the competitors as a straw poll, 75% were in favour of the switch, so the decision was customer-led. “The technical regulations have to be finalised and submitted to Motorsport UK for ratification but, as part of the process, the club had to demonstrate the strength of support for Hot Hatch, which we were able to do for the past seven years.” This season the average Hot Hatch arrival rate over six…

RALLYING Max McRae is due to make his gravel Rally2 debut on this weekend’s Cambrian Rally at the wheel of a Skoda Fabia R5. The grandson of British Rally Championship legend Jimmy has previously only competed in a Rally2 car on the Tarmac-focused McRae Rally Challenge at Knockhill, but is now looking forward to tackling Welsh woodland stages that are synonymous with McRae rallying success. “There’s so much history on those stages, it’s going to be fantastic to get in there and drive them,” said McRae. “The priority for me is to take experience of the R5. This is going to be quite different. It’s a chance to get out and end the year with some fun but, at the same time, I know it’ll help me next season.” The…

Erik Evans and Matt Cowley completed an unlikely British GT4 comeback to seal race and championship success at Donington. The GT4 drivers’ title appeared to be a done deal ahead of the penultimate round at Brands Hatch but a nil score for the #90 Optimum Motorsport-run McLaren Artura of Jack Brown and Charles Clark opened the door to Century Motorsport duo Michael Johnston/Chris Salkeld and Academy’s Evans and Cowley. The latter pair had topped the podium at Brands Hatch and built on this spectacularly at Donington with a drive from the lower reaches of the order to take the lead with 15 minutes remaining – a move that pushed them ahead in the standings despite arriving 16.5 points down on the leaders, and the deficit being over 50 points just…

GB3 Race 1 (10 laps) 1 Callum Voisin (below); 2 Matthew Rees +0.356s; 3 Alex Dunne; 4 James Hedley; 5 Souta Arao; 6 Max Esterson. Fastest lap Dunne 1m32.857s (96.43mph). Pole Voisin. Starters 22. Race 2 (13 laps) 1 Dunne; 2 Voisin +4.498s; 3 Esterson; 4 Rees; 5 McKenzy Cresswell; 6 Hedley. FL Dunne 1m22.335s (108.75mph). P Voisin. S 22. Race 3 (13 laps) 1 Gerrard Xie; 2 Edward Pearson +0.477s; 3 Patrick Heuzenroeder; 4 Nico Christodoulou; 5 Oliver Stewart; 6 Cresswell. FL Xie 1m23.729s (106.94mph). P Heuzenroeder. S 22. Points 1 Voisin 484; 2 Dunne 466; 3 Loake 417; 4 Cresswell 390; 5 Rees 370; 6 Hedley 347. For full results visit: tsl-timing.com…

Last year it was the Festival final that proved an embarrassing and curtailed contest. This time around it was the opening semi-final that struggled to reach a conclusion. An early red flag and then multiple abandoned starts sadly reduced it to a nine-lap, safety car affected affair. The original race was halted after a lap with Bob Hawkins in the Paddock Hill Bend barriers. Then, on the restart, Vincent Jay struggled to get off the grid so an extra green-flag lap was needed. But things became increasingly ridiculous as a host of other drivers were stranded, including polesitter Nolan Allaer. “You’ve got to keep calm and your experience comes into it,” said Chris Middlehurst, who was starting third, of the situation. “You’ve got to keep an eye on temperatures but…

Fourth place in the first TCR UK race of the Festival weekend secured the 2023 championship title for Carl Boardley in his Cupra, but the race wins were taken by Alex Ley’s Hyundai and Jac Constable in an Audi RS3. Jenson Brickley’s Cupra was missing from race-one pole with a gearbox problem, but joined in from the pits to reach sixth by the end, setting fastest lap. Chris Smiley’s troublesome Honda Civic led until half-distance before yielding to Ley and eventually stopped with power-steering failure. This allowed Callum Newsham and Adam Shepherd to complete an all-Hyundai podium. The first 10 were reversed for race two, and a multiple shunt on the drop down from Druids caused a red flag before a car off at Paddock at the second attempt then…

KIRKISTOWN 500MRCI 21 OCTOBER Storm Babet has been tempestuous for the UK and, while her effect on Scotland was little short of devastating, she still had enough energy to also provide Northern Ireland with a demonstration of her powers – which was not helpful for Kirkistown’s final meeting of the year. Two days before Saturday’s event, the circuit was more boating lake than race track. But, when race day dawned, Babet had fled, leaving a drying circuit and sunshine to greet the competitors. The first of three Saloon/GT bouts should have provided a title battle between the SEAT Supercopas of Gareth Blaine and Peter Baxter, but Baxter’s car decided to spontaneously combust after qualifying and was too badly damaged to continue. This took the pressure off Blaine, who instead left…

FORMULA 1 Reigning Formula E champion Jake Dennis will end his stellar 2023 by driving for Red Bull in FP1 at the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix. The Briton has been a simulator driver for the recently crowned Formula 1 constructors’ champion since 2018, and his reward for that service is a first public top-flight run. Dennis, who was third in the 2015 Formula 3 European Championship and fourth in GP3 in 2016, privately tested the Red Bull RB14 in 2018, but prior to his 2021 electric switch with Andretti he had moved away from the single-seater ladder to GT racing. The 28-year-old, winner of the 2012 McLaren Autosport BRDC Award, will help Red Bull satisfy the FIA criteria to run a rookie in each of its cars. Both Max Verstappen…

FORMULA E Formula E has added another permanent track to its schedule with a pair of races at Shanghai International Circuit, host of the Chinese Grand Prix, as part of a 16-race calendar for the 2024 season. The event will take place on 25-26 May, just over five years after FE last visited China with a race in the island city of Sanya. The series has not raced in the country since 2019 due to the pandemic. FE has long raced on a derivative of the permanent circuit that plays host to the Mexican GP, while a round at the Portland IndyCar venue was introduced this year. With the Rome street track regarded as too quick for the new Gen3 cars, nearby Vallelunga as well as Misano are in contention…

IMSA Two-time Daytona 24 Hours winner Tom Blomqvist will retain a foot in sportscar racing when he moves full-time into IndyCar next year with Meyer Shank Racing. The Brit will race for the 2023 title-winning Action Express Racing Cadillac squad in four of the IMSA SportsCar Championship enduros. Blomqvist will line up alongside Pipo Derani and Jack Aitken at Daytona, Sebring, Indianapolis and Petit Le Mans aboard the AXR Caddy V-Series.R. His announcement follows that of the Shank team he joined ahead of the 2022 season losing its deal with Acura to race in IMSA next year. He will not be able to race at June’s six-hour Watkins Glen round, where line-ups often comprise three drivers, after a date change means it now conflicts with the Laguna Seca IndyCar event.…

It was absorbing to watch Max Verstappen and Lewis Hamilton sit together before the post-race press conference following the Red Bull star’s victory in the United States Grand Prix last Sunday. Lando Norris followed them in much later due to his TV interviews dragging on. There was initially an icy silence. Hamilton broke it eventually, asking about Verstappen’s post-Austin travel plans. The reply was polite enough, pleasant even, from a delighted winner. But there was a distinct lack of eye contact on either side. Finally, Norris arrived. And as press conference host Tom Clarkson conducted last-minute discussions with F1 TV directors, Verstappen and Norris talked about the McLaren man’s travel-sticker livery for last weekend’s event. This extended to his race boots. Hamilton returned to his iPhone. The different narrative of…

Now that was a qualifying session worth watching. With Red Bull’s usual advantage wiped out by having to raise the RB19’s ride height to cope with the Austin bumps, and its rivals gaining from added mechanical grip afforded by the C4 soft tyres for one flier only, four teams suddenly had a pole shot. Mercedes driver Lewis Hamilton led Q1, while Ferrari’s Charles Leclerc topped Q2, with both opening segments featuring drivers missing out on progression due to track limits violations in the final corners, where the tyres cried enough on even rougher asphalt. Daniel Ricciardo and Nico Hulkenberg were the victims of their own falls. In Q3, Leclerc’s 1m34.829s had him in the prime spot by 0.056 seconds over Hamilton, with Verstappen third – 0.252s down and close to…

Lance Stroll rescued points for Aston Martin after the team opted for a pitlane start for the United States Grand Prix due to being dissatisfied with its car set-up. The Silverstone squad broke parc ferme to tune new updates on Lance Stroll’s AMR23 and roll Fernando Alonso back to the previous spec in efforts to get something out of the race. Although both cars were at the back on the opening lap after leaving the pitlane last, the two drivers worked their way into the points with strong tyre management and a strategy to stop later in each stint to offer a tyre offset. Alonso had got up to ninth and was closing on Pierre Gasly for eighth, but was forced to retire with floor damage. Stroll equally showed tenacity…

Alex Albon was lucky to chalk up points despite finishing 11th on the road, after a five-second track-limits penalty did not change his finishing position at the flag. The Williams driver crossed the line 6.3 seconds clear of team-mate Logan Sargeant, which was enough margin to mitigate any effect of his penalty. Despite an FIA investigation for further track limits offences at Turn 6, it noted that “the evidence at hand is not sufficient to accurately and consistently conclude that any breaches occurred”. After being on the fringes of the points throughout the race, but missing the final ingredients to make a breakthrough, Albon was promoted to ninth following disqualifications for Lewis Hamilton and Charles Leclerc. Sargeant was elevated to 10th to secure his first world championship point – the…

FORMULA REGIONAL EUROPEAN HOCKENHEIM (DEU) 21-22 OCTOBER ROUND 10/10 R-ace GP pair Martinius Stenshorne and Tim Tramnitz shared the wins at the Formula Regional European by Alpine finale to secure second and third respectively in the points. Tramnitz, newly anointed as a Red Bull Junior, made a corker of a move to get into the lead of the opening race. Poleman Kas Haverkort was attempting to repass Rafael Camara on the opening lap into the Spitzkehre hairpin, only for the German to chuck it around the outside of both of them and emerge in front. But some safety car interludes nearly did for Tramnitz. After the final restart with four laps remaining, he braked too late into Spitzkehre and had to be forceful to defend from Prema Racing-run Ferrari protege…

“Coming off the back of Donington was when I felt we were in a really good place. The car, me mentally, the team were fully behind me, NAPA were fully behind me. That was kind of the point where I thought, ‘Right, this is mine to lose. I just need to really focus on keeping out of trouble, keeping my nut down and doing the best job I can.’” The words are Ash Sutton’s, while pondering when he thought he might be looking in a strong position to win his fourth British Touring Car Championship title. And the cynics among you may think he’s referring to Donington round one, way back in April, when he exhibited scarily quick pace in the much-reworked Ford Focus ST. The NAPA-clad Motorbase Performance crew…

ASH SUTTON 1 The first driver in the BTCC’s 66-year history to win the title in rear and front-wheel-drive cars. Right from the start, he was absolutely phenomenal in the heavily revamped Focus. Sensational one-lap pace and spinetingling overtaking. TOM INGRAM 2 From electrical failure sidelining him from the first FP1 of the season, it was an uphill battle for the outgoing champ. But he never gave up, and took the Hyundai to 17 podiums. That’s remarkable in a car that rarely matched the Ford. JAKE HILL 3 Round five at Oulton was a turning point. Hill went his own way on set-up with the BMW and was totally inspired. Ended season with astonishing pass at Brands for win, but recurring boost sensor/misfire dramas cost too points. COLIN TURKINGTON 4…

The winter “reset” clearly worked for Dan Zelos. The 2021 Mini Challenge champion had a poor season last year as he only mustered three podiums when attempting to defend his title. Zelos admitted the pressure got to him at times and he therefore adopted a new approach for this campaign. “I wanted to come back and prove myself,” he says. “There were certainly points last year thinking, ‘Where has the pace gone, was it [2021 title] a fluke, was the pace actually there?’ But we went into the season with a really good head space. Everything seemed to click, and it was spot on from the get-go.” Sure enough, Zelos instantly dispelled last year’s disappointment by taking pole at Donington Park and winning two races. But then came a moment…

CSCC Two more championships are joining the Classic Sports Car Club’s ranks for next season, with the Jaguar Challenge and Midget & Sprite Challenge both adding to the club’s growing portfolio. The Jaguar category enjoyed a long spell of appearing at CSCC events when it was run by the Jaguar Enthusiasts’ Club, but it has spent the past three seasons with the Classic Touring Car Racing Club. Now it will be renamed as the CSCC Jaguar Championship, and former coordinator Chris Robinson is back in post. “We never really wanted them to go in the first place but, at the time, their grid numbers had been going down and down,” said CSCC director David Smitheram. “They ran with us but we had no part in the promotion and they were…

GB4 Radical Cup UK champion Theo Micouris made his slicks-and-wings debut with Elite Motorsport in the final round of GB4 at Donington Park last weekend. Micouris, who has starred in SR1 machinery with nine wins and 14 pole positions during his first year of car racing, made the switch as he evaluates options for 2024. He took two sixth places and a seventh across the three contests but, after limited running in pre-event testing, Micouris felt it could have gone even better. “It’s a tough one,” he said. “We’ve had a lot of potential. We had a lot of great pace but we’ve had such little testing, we’ve had quite a few issues throughout the weekend. “We were put on the back foot straight away and we had a couple…

Now that is what a Formula Ford Festival final should be like. Forget the damp squib that was last year’s brief affair, this was a proper contest. Twenty laps of uninterrupted action that had the crowd enthralled, featuring unbelievable overtakes between quality drivers and uncertainty over the winner right to the end. There was even some late unreliability drama for the brilliant Niall Murray to add another twist. It’s no wonder that Jamie Sharp, the 2021 victor who was part of the lead squabble, says: “You can never guess what’s going to happen – it’s the most unpredictable weekend!” It was the perfect tonic after the misery of last season, when risky scheduling and a reluctance from those in charge to react to the expected bad weather meant predicted rain…

DONINGTON PARK BRSCC 21-22 OCTOBER Nick White prevailed in his season-long fight with Ravi Ramyead to win the Ginetta GT Academy title in the final race at Donington Park last weekend. There was little to separate the pair heading into the deciding round after factoring in dropped scores, with White holding the advantage. Ramyead closed the deficit by dominating Saturday’s damp opener from pole ahead of White, who climbed one place to second ahead of the slow-starting Matt Shaw. Conditions were dry for Sunday’s two contests, which both proved far more dramatic. Shaw again bogged down from the outside of the front row in the first of those, allowing White to give chase to Ramyead once more. Under pressure at the halfway stage, Ramyead locked up and ran wide at…

There was an added poignancy surrounding one of the cars in this year’s event. The Reynard 89FF driven by 1980s Formula Ford frontrunner Andy Charsley carried stickers in memory of former Autosport editor Andy Hallbery, who died at the end of last year. Alan Bowles of Kejan Engineering – who also organised a well-attended Elden reunion and arranged an eclectic mix of single-seaters to be on display in the paddock that included an ex-Eddie Cheever Indycar and a Ralt RT3 – felt it was important to remember Hallbery at the first Festival since his passing. “I met Andy a couple of years ago at this event,” Bowles explained. “Andy helped me with writing my book [his account of 50 years of Formula Ford Festivals] – it fired his enthusiasm –…

SILVERSTONE MSVR/MRL 21-22 OCTOBER There was drama written all over Fred Shepherd’s far from straightforward victory in the Gerry Marshall Trophy at a Silverstone meeting last weekend that included a mixture of races from Motor Racing Legends and the Historic Racing Drivers Club. Richard Oldershaw started the race from pole in his ex-Brian Muir Rover SD1, but Shepherd used his Ford Boss Mustang 302’s extra power to blast into an immediate lead before drawing clear to win the 45-minute race by over 35 seconds from John and Jack Young’s Chevrolet Camaro. But things hadn’t been comfortable for Shepherd, as the 25-year-old explained: “In qualifying, the clutch wasn’t returning so the team [Bill Shepherd Automotive] had the gearbox apart, the clutch off and did a full driveline strip – we only…

Celebrations are in full swing following the conclusion of the 1956 Le Mans 24 Hours. The victorious driver pairing, who had shared an Ecurie Ecosse Jaguar D-type, take centre stage for this group photo: Ninian Sanderson (side on, in conversation), with co-holder of the floral arrangement Ron Flockhart behind. Joining them are Peter Collins (plus companion) and Stirling Moss, runners-up in their works Aston Martin DB3S. On the far right of the group are Ecurie Ecosse co-founders, legendary mechanic ‘Wilkie’ Wilkinson and team chief David Murray. For classic motorsport DVDs and downloads head to dukevideo.com For more great photographs, visit motorsportimages.com…