Greystone GT are delighted to announce a maiden full-time campaign in the International GT Open in 2023 with Andrew Gilbert and Fran Rueda.

The Silverstone-based team debuted in the Europe-wide series this September at the Red Bull Ring, Austria, and caused a stir by taking a Pro-Am class pole position a month later at the Barcelona season finale.

A full-season entry has now been confirmed; again with a Node4-supported McLaren 720S GT3 for the Anglo-Spanish pairing.

Nottingham-born Andrew, who is based in Dubai, began his racing career in the 2021 Ferrari Challenge Asia-Pacific; finishing on the podium three times in six races in the Coppa Shell Am division including two runner-up spots at Dubai Autodrome.

He delivered three top-five finishes in six Ferrari Challenge Europe rounds and ran strongly in the GT Open – which represented his first two weekends racing a GT3 car.

Fran, from Malaga, finished as the overall series runner-up in 2017 and 2018. He has also been a race winner in the Renault Sport Trophy and the SEAT Eurocup.

He and Andrew combined to twice score a best result of sixth in Pro-Am this year; the duo finishing all four of the races they contested.

GT Open is the second series in which Greystone GT has confirmed a presence for 2023; the other being the new McLaren Trophy.

Andrew Gilbert said: “I’m excited to be participating in a full season of International GT Open in 2023. Having only obtained my international race licence in February, to be on the verge of a podium finish against top-flight GT3 opponents in just nine months has been an incredible experience and a huge learning curve. Fran’s been there with me all the way from my first races in Ferrari Challenge Europe and we’ve started to build a strong way of working that is achieving positive progress on track. It has also been an excellent partnership with Greystone GT as we progressed into the GT3 category with the McLaren 720s, but the two GT Open rounds we participated in at the end of this season were real eye-openers in terms of how committed you have to be both in and out of the car if you want to be competitive. I have realistic expectations of what we can achieve this year but even now, having only just started preparations for 2023, I feel much more comfortable in the McLaren than at the first test so I’m confident we can take a big step forward in the first races of the year.”

Fran Rueda said: “I´m looking forward to racing in a full season of GT Open and being able to fight again for the championship. We have an intensive pre-season testing plan mapped out out so that we arrive at the first race as well-prepared as we possibly can be. For someone who only got their race licence 10 months ago, Andy’s made a pretty staggering improvement and that will only continue as we work through our pre-season testing programme. I have high hopes for the season and think that if we can stay out of trouble and make the improvements we’re capable of, we could potentially finish in the top three in Pro-Am. That would be a pretty incredible season, but together with Greystone GT, I think it’s possible.”

Mark McLoughlin, Team Principal, said: “It’s fantastic to be able to convert two exploratory outings in the International GT Open this year into a full season in 2023. We’re delighted to continue our journey with Andrew and Fran; a line-up with a huge amount of potential going forwards, as their top-six Pro-Am finishes in both Austria and Spain – and the class pole position at the last round – have already proven. The new season has already begun for us with an incredibly productive three-day test at Portimao recently that’s validated a lot of the steps forward we’ve taken already and put us in a strong position to move even further up the order once the racing gets underway. Andrew’s made huge progress since he drove the GT3 McLaren for the first time in August, both in terms of peak pace and consistency and that leaves me extremely excited about what we could potentially achieve in 2023.”

International GT Open calendar 2023

Round 1: Portimao (P) – Apr 29-30

Round 2: Spa-Francorchamps (B) – May 27-28

Round 3: Hungaroring (H) – Jun 17-18

Round 4: Paul Ricard (F) – Jul 22-23

Round 5: Red Bull Ring (A) – Sep 09-10

Round 6: Monza (I) – Sep 23-24

Round 7: Barcelona (E) – Oct 21-22