The DSC Editor caught up with SRO’s Benjamin Franassovici during the very well attended British GT Championship Media Day at Donington Park earlier this month, to discuss the upcoming season, which begins this weekend at Oulton park.
The chat came in the wake of a very impressive full-season entry announcement which features high quality in GT3 and numbers and variety in GT4, as Franassovici’s small team work to ensure success for the UK National Championship and for their other major project, Blancpain GT Series Asia.
Benjamin, after the perhaps cautionary approach, particularly towards GT3 in the latter part of 2017, is the entry, and the quality, for the 2018 British GT Championship a surprise?
“The quality level is a big surprise but very satisfactory.
“GT3 is a better result than we were expecting. I could feel it was very possible. 10 cars was always achievable with more on the ‘possible’ list’. This is one of those times when more than usual of the new entries have managed to make it.
“The cars, driver pairings and the calibre of the drivers coming is very satisfactory.”
Both Rick Parfitt and Shaun Balfe have observed that rather than feeling negative about the championship seeing this level of intake from the factory teams, it is actually a positive, giving them both a measure for their own progress and to look forward to another measure of success. They want to beat these guys?
“We have always had good quality and very talented drivers but this is a level up definitely and whilst it might potentially be intimidating for some for others it’s a massive bonus. The bar has definitely gone up a notch or two and it’s something we are proud of.”
GT4 too is impressive here for both variety and numbers?
“We have had to turn four entries away. GT4 has taken a step too, it has taken its time to get here, back in 2010 it was a bit ‘wonky’ but we persevered and after a few difficult years it started to gather some momentum.
“It’s great to see the grid where we are today with excellent and ‘sexy’ brands like Mclaren and Jaguar. It feels like a turning point not just with the numbers but the variety too. We are seeing it too in Europe and Asia will be the next platform where we see that change coming with numbers growing.”
You must be particularly pleased that the Jaguar GT4 programme has come here?
“I’ve known about it for a while, and I know you have too, but again you keep your feet on the ground. Those projects are very tough to put together.
“They need a lot of investment, a lot of people need to come together committing to make it happen but I think James Holder knows the British GT platform well and made it clear from the start that this is where he wanted the programme to be.
“It’s great to have ‘crazy’ people because we all come together here – without them we wouldn’t have these amazing things happening.”
GT4 though could be coming to a watershed couldn’t it? So many major factory customer racing programmes are emerging. Could we be approaching a point where the class splits? Where the minnows are unable to deal with the arms race?
“It’s a fair point. We still have that variety here but…
When something is attractive it brings with it more and more people and their interests
“When something is attractive it brings with it more and more people and their interests. Some of those people will push the envelope and it’s something we have had to be very careful about here, to keep it healthy.
“That’s not always easy, there are very few specific tools to keep it that way. In the office we spend more time on the smaller teams than the bigger teams.
“The bigger ones don’t need us to hold their hands so much, sometimes the smaller ones are the ones that need the guidance, need a bit more help, and that’s goo because the give you their loyalty in return. That helps us to build a happier grid and our sporting regulations are written to make sure that everyone has a fair chance of success.
“I’m very proud of what such a small team has achieved, just Lauren, Tom and myself. To see the entry that has resulted from the hard work that has been happening for months is a proud moment.
“The same team takes car of Asia too and that has been a success too, hard work in a hugely different environment and that is paying off too.
“One other thing which has been a surprise over the past two years and certainly bucks the trend – The public are coming back to British GT race weekends.
“We had serious numbers last year, even without a promotional budget.
We had serious numbers last year, even without a promotional budget
“Silverstone last year saw the potential and put some resource and energy behind it and we got close to 15,000 , Oulton Park was 18-19,000, Rockingham was good and busy and that is not an easy track to bring people along – that’s a big satisfaction.”
And what about TV and live streaming for 2018, for such a well supported championship the lack of that option is now unusual?
“We are still working on it and I am pushing very, very hard to have streaming and we are trying to do other things as well.
“It’s important, it’s not cheap, and SRO and the championship can’t be the only ones to pay to make it happen. I’m pulling all the strings I can and that is what we are heading for.”
Note: there will be streaming for the races at Oulton Park.
Both of Monday’s 60-minute races will be streamed live on the championship’s Facebook page and website, as well SRO’s GT World Youtube channel.
