The Motor Racing Spectator

55 GT3 cars....a decent weather forecast.....£30 in the wallet...plus a large flask of Yorkshire Tea...! Yes it was time for The Spectator to go to one of the highlights of the racing year. The Blancpain GT Series has established itself as THE place to race your very expensive GT3 car. The week before at Brands Hatch had seen  the Sprint version of the series while at Silverstone it was the turn of the 3-Hour Endurance Cup. Silverstone was bathed in late Spring sunshine when I arrived at 8.45am but following overnight rain the circuit was wet but drying rapidly. Kicking off proceedings was qualifying for the weekend's second Formula Renault 2.0 Eurocup race. A large entry of 30 cars for a class that bucks the trend in modern single-seater racing. With the FIA intent on homogenising the single-seater ladder from F4 to F3 to F2 to F1, Formula Renault fits in as an excellent training series with a calendar that races on mostly F1 circuits. With Renault increasing its backing for ...

After a 6 week hiatus it was time for The Spectator to go to a (long overdue!) race meeting. In the week leading up to the weekend I was very tempted to go to Rockingham for British GT but in the end common sense prevailed and I plumped for the final day of the annual Donington Historic Festival organised by the Historic Sports Car Club. As you can see from the ticket stub, entry on the day was a whopping £27 and with no discount for the humble Donington Supporters Club member either, I somewhat begrudgingly coughed up the cash as I was desperate to see some racing! The Donington Historic Festival is a somewhat curious affair....it's essentially a padded out out HSCC meeting with a few "different" races scattered throughout the programme. First up on Sunday morning was a 2 hour GT and Sports Car Cup race featuring a mammoth 40 car grid. The early stages saw a good battle for the lead between the AC Cobra's of Oliver Bryant  and ex Touring Car driver Anthony Reid....