FIA GT, Bucharest – Preview
A New Format In The Heat Of Romania

Three weeks after the Spa 24 Hours, the FIA GT Championship heads east for its second visit to the street circuit around Nicolae Ceausescu's old gaff. The contrast couldn’t be greater, with a new race format being tried out and with considerably warmer weather.

Last year, in May, the rain was virtually unrelenting and a great deal of carnage was visited on the FIA GT and GT3 fields around the concrete-lined track. This year, the FIA GT field has the place almost to itself (only British F3 and the local Dacia Logan Cup sharing the bill) and will be faced with temperatures that will threaten 40º Celsius.

In stark contrast to the Spa enduro, Round 6 of the championship will be a one-hour race, with the grid being set by a non-points scoring qualifying race of the same duration on Saturday evening. Quite how teams will approach the qualifying race has been the subject of considerable conjecture. Will they take it steady to avoid the risk of damage, or will they treat it like any other race and fight for the lead – potentially running into trouble - knowing that in a 60-minute race, a good qualifying position is likely to be crucial?

25 cars are making the trip to Eastern Europe; comprising of 11 GT1s, 13 GT2s and a solitary G2.

For Vitaphone Racing Team, Spa could not have gone better; with a 1-2 result and maximum points, while their main rivals all hit trouble.

Michael Bartels and Andrea Bertolini now have a 13 point lead in the #1 over the #2 Maserati MC12, with Fabrizio Gollin and Mike Hezemans in third place on 29.5. Bertolini won last year in the Scuderia Playteam Sarafree MC12, so should be a favourite in 2008, but the #1 will also have to contend with 105kg of ballast.

Jetalliance Racing and SRT will be trying hard to forget Spa, but both cars have been rebuilt (unlike the absent Larbre Saleen) and both will be determined to get back in the championship hunt again; the Austrian team back to two Aston Martin DBR9s for this weekend.

“We are going to Bucharest to win,” said Ryan Sharp, “because now our only chance is to finish right up front in each and every race that’s left on the schedule.”

“This is a street course that won’t forgive any mistakes,” said Karl Wendlinger. “We have to try to find good traction and an ideal behaviour under braking for our Jetalliance Aston Martin DBR9 in practice. That’s the foundation. But we already solved that very well last year. That’s why I’m very confident for this year as well.”

By finishing third at Spa, Gigawave MotorSport gave itself a real boost and moved its two drivers up to fourth in the championship (at the cost of 40kg of ballast).

“Qualifying is so important at a track like this,” said Allan Simonsen. “Overtaking in the races is going to be tougher than on a circuit like Monza or Spa, so where we start on the grid is key. I have not raced here before so I’ve been watching some of the on-board footage from last year’s race and I’m pretty confident that I can learn the layout quickly. I am used to racing on street circuits, following my time in Australia, so I feel more than ready.”

Gigawave Motorsport’s other driver, Philipp Peter, said, “I really love street circuits and although I’ve not raced at Bucharest before, I’m excited about hitting the track as I have a lot of experience and success on circuits such as this. The 40kg weight will cause us a slight issue but that’s what it’s supposed to do!”

In GT2, the leaders didn’t fare so well at Spa, with the two AF Corse cars collecting just 14 points between them. Toni Vilander and Gimmi Bruni still lead by 14 points, but now have the two BMS Scuderia Italia Ferrari F430s behind them – the #77 Malucelli/Ruberti pairing leading the #78 Camathias/Rigon car by four points.

Prospeed Competition’s Richard Westbrook and Emmanuel Collard doubled their season points total at Spa, leaving the #61 Porsche in fourth place. 

CR Scuderia were lifted by bringing both of the 430s home at Spa at the first attempt and are looking to carry the momentum forward to Bucharest.

I really enjoyed Bucharest last year,” said Chris Niarchos. “It’s a scary track but it really suited me and I was quick during testing.  Street circuits like this put me at an advantage as it’s a short, squirt track where you have to muscle the car around. We’re still in the fight for second in the Teams’ Championship; it’s going to be very tough catching BMS after their victory at Spa but I love a challenge!”

“We’ve been getting better and better as we go through the FIA GT season,” said Andrew Kirkaldy. “The team works incredibly well now so we’ve no reason to think we can’t get a good result here. It will be interesting with the one-hour race format. We’ll have to be very careful in race one to make sure we still have a car for race two when the points are scored.”

Things get underway on Thursday evening with a parade, before practice begins on Friday. The schedule:

THURSDAY
2000 GT Parade

FRIDAY
1500-1620 Free Practice

SATURDAY
0845-1005 Pre-Qualifying
1315-1350 Qualifying
1815-1915 Race 1

SUNDAY
1000-1030 Warm Up
1415-1515 Race 2