A brief social media announcement on Monday has confirmed that the FFF Racing Group, which raced under a variety of monikers in its operating life since 2014, has called time on its motorsport activities.
Established by co-owners Fu Songyang and Andrea Caldarelli, the team competed initially with Mclaren to race-winning success in the now defunct GT Asia, taking the drivers title in only their second full season in 2016 (by then with Lamborghini) for Eduardo Liberati and Andrea Amici.
There were adventures in the Michelin GT3 Cup (now Michelin Le Mans Cup), Asian Le Mans Series and International GT Open before the focus shifted to the Blancpain GT Series where the team scored groundbreaking successes in both Asia and Europe.
The 2018 Blancpain GT Series Asia saw FFF drivers Martin Kodrić and Dennis Lind claim both the overall and Silver Class championships, with Hiroshi Hamaguchi claiming the Pro-Am drivers title alongside Marco Malpelli. FFF also took the teams crown.
2019 saw the team’s focus switch to Europe and, if anything, they saw more success still on the bigger stage. Marco Mapelli and team co-owner Andrea Caldarelli made the most of full Lamborghini factory support to sweep the board scoring the Sprint, Endurance, and Overall championships in the Pro category with the team also claiming the Pro class Overall and Endurance team’s championship titles.
If that wasn’t enough Phil Keen and long-time team customer Hiroshi Hamaguchi also took the Pro-Am class team’s and driver’s titles in the Sprint Cup in the same year.
Along the way there was other high profile racing too in eluding outings at the Nurburgring in VLN competition, at Bathurst or the 12 Hour and around the streets of Macau too!
The Chinese-flagged team suffered more than most though in the melee of the COVID 19 pandemic and despite announcing a high profile ESports effort and later an attempt to refocus on single make Lamborghini Super Trofeo competition it seems that the adventure is over, with a last GT3 hurrah at the Nurburgring 24 Hours it seems, the team’s statement reading:
“It has been a fantastic journey, which has allowed us to achieve insane results: we enjoyed every stint, every lap, every turn of it.
“On the day we announce the end of our racing activities, we would like to thank all those who have accompanied us along the way: from the drivers to the engineers, from the mechanics to the fans, you have all supported us by pushing us towards even more ambitious goals.
“It was a hell of a ride: we hope you enjoyed it as much as we did!”
