It’s always good to hear that there’s a future role in the sport in prospect for a long-standing driver in our field when they decide to hang up their helmet.
Such was the case with Rob Bell when he shared the news with us that he was to be named as McLaren Motorsport’s new sporting director as he stepped away from pro driving with 20 years in sportscar racing on his CV.
That run started with a win, out of the blue, in his GT racing debut in the Le Mans Series in 2005 at Nürburgring. Bell shared a ConversBank / Cirtek – entered Aston Martin DBR9 and took the class win with Darren Turner (Frederic Dor was listed to drive too but never drove).
The call to put ex-single seater racer Bell into the Aston proved to be an inspired choice and placed him on the map for others to call up the talented Geordie.
Next up was a race-winning season in the Le Mans Series GT2 class with Team LNT and its Panoz Esperante GTLM. Poor reliability in the early part of the year cost any thought of a title run, but a pair of late-season race wins with Warren Hughes proved the pace had always been there!
A Le Mans debut came the following year, again with LNT in a Panoz. Fifth in class was as the result in what would be the first of nine appearances at La Sarthe, with a pair of fourth places in class – 2009 (GT2) and 2016 (GTE Am) – his best results at the great race.
He shone in full-season Le Mans Series action with Virgo Motorsport and aboard Jim McWhirter’s bright yellow Ferrari 430 GT2, scoring back-to-back titles in 2007 and 2008 alongside Allan Simonsen and Gianmaria Bruni. They were career highlights and came at the start of a period that saw him race and test a huge variety of GT2 and GTE machinery.
He gained a reputation for being an extremely capable tyre tester at this time too. He’s still name checked regularly to this day for in conversations with tyre engineers – for his ability to give useful feedback and take on challenging briefs. His work with Dunlop back in the day should not be overlooked.
Alongside his Panoz and Ferrari programmes came efforts with Porsche (Paul Miller Motorsports), Aston Martin (JMW, Drayson Racing and the factory AMR team), Doran Ford (Richardson Racing), Ferrari 458 (ESM), and the factory SRT Viper squad, together with testing mileage with the RSR Jaguar and its XKR GT2.
There was an LMP1 appearance in the ALMS too, again with Drayson Racing and its Lola, an LMP2 outing with ESM and an HPD, and a one-off GT4 outing with United Autosports at Silverstone in the British GT Championship. The latter saw Rob score a race win together with younger brother Matt in a Ginetta G50!
Then came a new phase of his career as a factory driver for McLaren, which led him to his new role outside the cockpit.
This stint brought race wins and championship titles in the Asian Le Mans Series, International GT Open, and Blancpain Endurance Cup alongside test and development duties with the MP4/12 GT3, 650S GT3, 570S GT4, 720S GT3 and Artura GT4.
Add into that brand ambassadorial duties, perhaps most notably at the 2021 Goodwood Festival of Speed when he took the title in the timed Hillclimb aboard the unrestricted 720S GTX.
All of that though is just part of the story, because his time in motorsport is far from over.
It’s Rob’s character that will define the progress and success in his new role. And we’re as sure as we can be that he’ll excel in this chapter too.
