Team Bruichladdich Becomes Greaves Motorsport

dsc caught up with Jacob Greaves to chat about the preparations for the season ahead for what used to be called Team Bruichladdich – But no more.

So what’s going on Jacob?

“The team is now called Greaves Motorsport.  There was some pressure from the French advertising authorities who prohibit alcohol advertising so we felt it best not to push a point."

“The car though will still carry Bruichladdich backing in markets that permit it and the ownership of the team remains the same as before.”

That puts Tim Greaves as Team Principal, the owner having decided to stand down from driving duties.

“He’ll be spending more of his time than before on the pit wall.  Paul Thomas is still with us as Race Engineer and I continue as Team Manager.”

The driving squad for the Le Mans Series is already in place too – Karim Ojjeh is back together with Gary Chalandon who raced for the team at Le Mans in 2010.  That pair will be joined in the full LMS by quick Norwegian Thor Christian Ebbesvik but Thor Christian is not so far slated to appear at Le Mans – Ojjeh and Chalandon will be joined by a third driver yet to be finalised if the team is selected.

Ojjeh though has already had a winning start to the year with the team, he shared a Radical SR8 entered by the team in the opening edition of the Oreca Winter Series at Paul Ricard over the weekend, a drive he shared by the ever enthusiastic Paul Thomas (The last time we saw Paul out on track was when he paid his own money to turn laps in the teams Radical SR9 on the Le Mans Test Day back in 2008!)

The pair took the fight to another trio of Radical SR8s and a solo Formula Le Mans car and came away with a triple overall win – Not bad going at all.

The team’s Zytek LMP2 car meanwhile is prepped and ready for the installation of its new Zytek NISMO engine – More on the engine in a piece later today but Greaves Motorsport have high hopes that the engine selection will prove to be competitive.  If so we could see the #41 car back on the kind of form which saw it challenging for class podium finishes in 2010.