FIA GT Championship

Planetlemans.com FIA GT 2007 preview

© FIA GT

The FIA GT test days at Monza are approaching fast and so it is time for the Planetlemans season preview. With a new race length for 2007, two hours instead of three, and the addition of the Citation GT1 Cup for non-professionals the series hopes to attract more teams and spectators. It remains to be seen if the spectators will return to the series, but the teams seem to like the new format.

© Planetlemans

At the end of 2006 GT1 seemed to be on the edge of collapsing all over the world. Teams in the European and American Le Mans Series were dropping out, but the new rules in the FIA GT Championship seem to help this series grow in 2007. The confirmed car count just before the Monza test days stood at 14, with another 3 cars possible to join the series, which means there will be more GT1 cars in FIA GT than there are in both Le Mans Series.

Vitaphone Racing Team, the 2006 champion, might only run one Maserati MC12, but it will be a title contender with Bartels/Biagi behind the wheel. The second car is not confirmed at this point, but there are several other MC12s to make up for the loss of a Vitaphone car. Scuderia Playteam SaraFree will join the championship with two cars and the top pairing Bertolini/Piccini, while JMB Racing will rejoin the GT1 class with another two MC12’s.

Direct competition for the Maserati racing cars will have to come from the Aston Martin DBR9s. BMS Scuderia Italia has already confirmed two cars, with Babini and Davies in the lead car. The other Aston Martin entries will be from Race Alliance (for Karl Wendlinger) and Barwell Motorsport, a part-time entry. The Phoenix Racing team, which won the last race of 2006, has not committed itself to the series so far and is rumoured to be focusing on DTM instead of going back to FIA GT.

After a disastrous 2006 season All-Inkl.com has joined forces with Reiter Engineering and will enter two Lamborghini Murcielago R-GTs. The team did some intensive testing during the winter break and hopes to impress with the improved car. Despite signing experienced drivers like Peter Kox and Christophe Bouchut they will probably have a tough job though.

Last but not least there will once again be some American muscle power in the series. Instead of the single Chevrolet Corvette we saw in 2006, in the hands of GLPK Carsport, there might now be 4 Corvettes, 3 of them being C6-Rs. Unfortunately the teams that are running the cars, Belgian teams PSI and GLPK, have not been able to equal the results Corvette Racing got when they ran the cars at Le Mans and in the American Le Mans Series and have suffered numerous problems last year that prevented them from battling for the championship. The other American muscle car, the Zakspeed-Saleen that stunned many in 2006, will not return for the 2007 season.

In contrast to the GT1 class the FIA GT2 class does not appear to attract the number of cars the series organisers would like to have. SRO’s Stephane Ratel recently complained about the number of Porsche 997s in the series, but for now his words were not heard by the responsible team managers. Where both Le Mans Series are nearly oversubscribed in the GT2 class the FIA GT2 has got 11 potential entries. Six of them are Ferrari 430s, 2 new Porsche 997s and 3 older Porsche 996 cars.BMS Scuderia Italia has entered Porsche works driver Emmanuel Collard in their car, together with Matteo Malucelli. The other new 997 is entered by Tech9 Motorsport.

Top GT2 Ferrari team AF Corse is yet to announce its 2007 plans, but fellow Ferrari team Scuderia Ecosse will enter a superb two car line-up with quick and experienced Tim Mullen joined by Czech star drivers Tomas Enge and Jarek Janis, who will be sharing the seat throughout the season.

At the American Le Mans Series test at Sebring a Porsche 997 GT3 RSR clocked the fastest time, so it will be interesting to see what the new Porsche can do against the already proven Ferrari 430s in Europe. Porsche hopes the new car can put the German manufacturer back on top in the GT2 class, but that remains to be seen as the Ferrari 430 teams in the FIA GT championship are very strong.

So why is GT1 booming business in FIA GT and GT2 not? It looks like the GT1 cars are too expensive to race for long periods, like in the Le Mans Series, and the new FIA GT race format means a better return on investment. The exact opposite applies to the GT2 class. A GT2 car is less expensive to race and therefore it seems that team owners prefer to race in long distance races instead of the two hour races in the FIA GT. Perfect examples of this are JMB Racing and Team Felbermayr-Proton who left the FIA GT2 class to race in the Le Mans Series where they can do long races with their GT2 cars.

marcel@planetlemans.com