Podium joy for Ross Gunn at Spa

Aston Martin team finish third in famous 24-hour race
Ross Gunn and his Garage 59 Aston Martin team mates finished the Spa 24 Hours in third position (Picture SRO)Ross Gunn and his Garage 59 Aston Martin team mates finished the Spa 24 Hours in third position (Picture SRO)
Ross Gunn and his Garage 59 Aston Martin team mates finished the Spa 24 Hours in third position (Picture SRO)

Ross Gunn and his Garage 59 Aston Martin Racing team-mates, Nicki Thiim and Marco Sorensen, finished last weekend's TotalEnergies Spa 24 Hour race in third positon write Colin and James Beckett.

The lead Aston Martin in the twice round the clock endurance race for GT3 cars was always in the hunt for victory - crossing the finish line just under one and half minutes behind the race winning Iron Lynx Ferrari 488 GT3 of Alessandro Pier Guidi, Come Ledogar and Niklas Nielsen. Team WRT Audi finished second, just three seconds behind the winning car, with an Audi R8 GT3 driven by Dries Vanthoor, Kelvin van der Linde and Charles Weerts.

Gunn's number 95 car was added to the entry list by the Garage 59 team to allow the marque to field a Pro Class entry in the race, and Gunn and his Aston Martin factory-supported team-mates, all performed superbly throughout a race that was held in mixed weather conditions. For a period of the event torrential rain fell on the track located deep in the Ardennes region of Belgium, making it difficult for all.

Gunn said: "This was such hard work! The race is always frantic at the start, as every team wants to make progress. There was almost an instant delay, after a big crash for four cars, and it meant every team had to reset their plans for the race ahead. The weather conditions also made things difficult. The rain was so hard at times, it was virtually impossible to see where you were going."

Continuing, "This was though a great result for the team and for Aston Martin. I am so proud to have been able to drive the number 95 Vantage GT3 here at Spa. This is a race I will long remember."

Gunn's team-mates in the number 159 Garage 59-entered Aston Martin, Tuomos Tujula, Alex MacDowall, Valentin Hasse Clot and Nicolai Kjaergaard, finished fourteenth overall - third in the Silver Cup class of the race.

* Stephen Skipworth and James Dean raced their Aston Martin Monoposto Speed Model to a superb fifth place finish in the Motor Racing Legends (MRL) Pre-War BRDC 500 race at Silverstone Classic last weekend. The duo raced the car in a forty minute event around the Silverstone Historic Grand Prix Circuit on Saturday morning, finishing just shy of the podium in a race won by Fred Wakeman and Patrick Blakeney-Edwards at the wheel of a Frazer Nash TT.

A near full grid of pre-war sports cars took to the track for the second race on an action-packed event that featured twenty-races for the world's leading racers of historic cars. The BRDC 500 mile race, originally held at the Brooklands track in Surrey during 1929, was celebrated at Silverstone Classic with the race winner's presented with a special trophy on behalf of the British Racing Drivers' Club by well-known race commentator, Ian Titchmarsh.

Simon Garrad was also in action Silverstone, driving his Nissan Skyline R32 to a fourth place finish in the Adrian Flux Trophy for Historic Touring Cars. The race was won by a Sierra Cosworth RS500 driven by Mark Wright and Dave Coyne, while Freddie Hunt - son of 1976 F1 world champion - was a retirement when the Nissan Skyline he was driving developed mechanical problems mid-race.

* Tom Ingram endured a difficult weekend of Kwik Fit British Touring Car Championship racing at Oulton Park in his Ginsters EXCELR8 with TradePrice Cars Hyundai i30N car. Despite currently classified second in the 2021 Drivers' Standings, Ingram could only manage a best of tenth, including the setting of a fastest race lap, in his second race of the weekend. Placed five points behind series leader, Ash Sutton, Ingram will continue his camapign at Knockhill in ten day's time.

* The British GT Championship will continue on Sunday, with rounds five and six of its 2021 season taking place at Snetterton in Norfolk. Vale-based racer, Andrew Howard, will start this weekend's event placed second overall in the points table. The Beechdean Aston Martin Racing driver has shared his car with both Jonny Adam and Ross Gunn this year, and is just 2.5 points behind the championship leading pairing of Leo Matchitski and Dennis Lind (Lamborghini).