2017 Blancpain GT Series

[J Jay]

The latter. I suspect SRO will gradually pare the harshness back, but what happened at Monza (the accident, the reaction from M-Sport and the total communication breakdown) is not something anyone wants to see repeated.

[AndrewCherry]

The penalties are uncommonly harsh in broader terms, but I think the specifics are pretty interesting (ignoring the DQ for ignoring the black flag, which is nothing new). They appear to have moved to harsher penalties for causing accidents with lower level classes - so a Pro driver taking out an Am driver, will result in them throwing the book at you. Pro on Pro - not so much, usual racing incident assumptions apply.

You could argue this either way, but it's interesting, and perhaps most importantly, it gives a massive incentive to play it safe with the Am drivers. And that's critical I think because as someone mentioned earlier in the thread, the cost is becoming prohibitive. Without gentleman drivers, the series doesn't do as well - without finishing races (and without massive repair bills) gentleman drivers won't come. So, you could look at it as clever protection. I'd be surprised if we see many 5 minutes penalties in future as I think drivers will be giving Am cars a huge amount of distance!

[Alfaholic]

There has been a crackdown on contact within both parts of the Blancpain GT series, details here...

https://www.motorsport.com/bes/news/...e-race-906348/

[chunterer]

Such a great series. Although it serms the Lambo needs pegging back a little...

Some tremendous racing throughout. Lots of stories from the race...

[Greem]

The sight, sound and smell of the assembled field thundering past me on the Wellington Straight on the first racing lap on Sunday made what little hair I still have stand up straight. Bloody awesome.

My blue flag arm certainly got a workout, too.

One for next year's diary!

[Miguel]

Originally Posted by chunterer

Such a great series. Although it serms the Lambo needs pegging back a little...

I don't think it does. It won only by tenths and didn't dominate, and didn't in Monza either. What I think is going on is Grasser Lamborghini and especially Mirko Bortolotti just being the best. Always hard to really know for sure with BoP involved, though.

If anyone's interested, I had a short talk with Christian Klien recently, about Emil Frey Racing and the Jaguar: http://www.gt-report.com/2017/05/14/...e-of-teamwork/

[FIRE]

Originally Posted by Miguel

If anyone's interested, I had a short talk with Christian Klien recently, about Emil Frey Racing and the Jaguar: http://www.gt-report.com/2017/05/14/...e-of-teamwork/

Thanks

[GT6]

thanks Miguel, was watching those cars race at monza (on telly unfortunately) and as a jag owner/fan wanted to know a little more about the team, pity jaguar waste there money on trolling around at the back of formula boring rather than taking part in real racing

[The Badger]

I had the chance to see these cars at the Macau GP last year .

I never knew they were so exciting ..... excellent cars .

But I expect their bell has tolled , at almost half a million euro for a Benz , the writing is on the wall .

[Miguel]

That's what people keep saying but meanwhile teams buy their cars and the fields keep growing and new GT3 series keep popping up worldwide. Apparently it's very much worth its price. And when they get too expensive, the market should do its job and drive the prices back down/

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by Miguel

That's what people keep saying but meanwhile teams buy their cars and the fields keep growing and new GT3 series keep popping up worldwide. Apparently it's very much worth its price. And when they get too expensive, the market should do its job and drive the prices back down/

That's never historically worked. When series get too expensive, teams just leave and go to other ones and the prices don't recover because the car prices are still expensive, and to come down would need new cars developed to sell at a lower price, but nobody does that because the teams are leaving so it's too much of a risk.

GT3 is brilliant and it is still expanding, but they do need to be careful with the costs. It won't regulate itself.

[TF110]

They charge that much and get it because the Mercedes is in demand. Wherever you look, any gt3 series, it's at the top or not far off. If you are looking for a gt3, that car is probably the first on the list. There are cheaper options, but are they worth it?

[Miguel]

Originally Posted by Akrapovic

That's never historically worked.

Until GT3 came around, BoP, customer racing-based racing had never been done before. GT3 is such an open category that you can go many ways with it and one is to build much cheaper cars, get some BoP help, and still be competitive. I really do not see how GT3, just as long as everyone is behind it, can ever go tits up. And maybe I'll be proven wrong, but that won't be any time soon.

[chunterer]

I have to agree, certainly as far as the international series goes.
There will definitely be at least one new make represented next year.

[Bcarr6]

Originally Posted by chunterer

I have to agree, certainly as far as the international series goes.

There will definitely be at least one new make represented next year.

One new make being??

[chunterer]

Originally Posted by Bcarr6

One new make being??

We'll see either the NSX or Lexus for a start and what about the Superdry backed FType?

[old man]

I think penalties may be being seen as a way of reducing contact in the early laps of a race. As I think I said earlier in this thread, insurance costs are very high to the point that some drivers are reluctant to take the opening stint if there is a choice. With the excess figures at €25k + it is understandable and avoiding accident situations is a skill learned with time in the car

[chernaudi]

Avoiding contact and accidents in racing sadly is like avoiding bullets if you enlist in the army and you get called up. You may've volunteered to join, but when you get called up, you go or else get stuck in the brig until you agree to. Eventually, if you race for long enough, you're gonna wreck, even if it's not your fault or due to contact.

I think such draconian penalties will only serve to take away hard racing and not punish offenders or crap or poor driving standards and race craft. If you're going to be so harsh, do it on a case by case basis like F1 nowadays or the WEC does. This reminds me of how IMSA dumped Paul Walter from race control and re-hired Beaux Barfield when he left Indy Car.

[Bcarr6]

Originally Posted by chunterer

We'll see either the NSX or Lexus for a start and what about the Superdry backed FType?

Good point

The super dry F type is a GT4

[divxx]

The start of the race maybe should have been called off, it was a mess with everyone trying to jump ahead of the green.

As for the race, does Yacaman have a lot of money backing him? No one in sportscar racing has had as many red mist moments, and he's never been all that fast.

[Akrapovic]

Originally Posted by divxx

The start of the race maybe should have been called off, it was a mess with everyone trying to jump ahead of the green.

It was a mess behind, but if I was Strakka I'd be furious over the penalty for the 59. Watson was not out of place at all. He was behind the pole car for the entire run up to the SF line, and never accelerated until the green. It was a BS penalty from SRO.

[chernaudi]

Maybe the race director from the SRO need to take a lesson from the ACO's race director for the WEC and LMS on how to run a race.

[Akrapovic]

That was a bloody terrible start. About 4 or 5 cars were ahead of the leader at the start line. If Strakka were penalised for a non-incident yesterday, half the grid is about to be banned for a year.

[Akrapovic]

Two drive throughs for the leader. Two, lol.

[J Jay]

Zolder has always been a race with incidents but this year it's been a mess, and quite frankly the wildly inconsistent stewarding has made it worse.