Greystone GT scored a double McLaren Trophy Europe victory plus a pair of GT Cup podium finishes at last weekend as the Silverstone-based team took a step towards a second major title in as many years.
With Ryan James and Oli Webb triumphant at the Nurburgring and Andrey Borodin and Ed Pead making the rostrum on home soil, it was another successful weekend for the squad.
McLaren Trophy Europe
Ryan James and Oli Webb continued their domination of the 570S Trophy class at the Nurburgring, Germany, despite being faced with ever-changing conditions across the weekend that tested even the most experienced of GT racers.
Ryan scored pole position in a damp session on Saturday by 0.4 seconds and set a controlled pace during the opening race; losing the class lead once the competitors were released after a safety-car start, but regaining it before the mandatory driver changes.
Once aboard, Oli pulled away to victory by over a minute and the Knutsford racer – a Le Mans 24 Hour podium finisher – again drove into the distance in Sunday’s dry encounter; Ryan having earlier taken pole for the fifth race in succession.
Their lead significantly reduced due to having to serve a 15-second success penalty at the pitstops (due to their Saturday win), Ryan conserved his tyres well and scored a fifth win of the season by 36 seconds.
The result puts the pair 34 points clear of their nearest rivals with only 60 available from the remaining pair of double-header events at Monza and Barcelona.
Team-mates Ron Trenka and Duncan Tappy scored their biggest points haul of the season in Germany as they twice finished fifth in the Artura class.
New York native Ron qualified a season’s-best seventh on Saturday and, backed up by Pro racer Duncan, ran well in the wet.
After Duncan reached the Race Two pitstops just four seconds away from the race lead, Ron looked set to challenge for a podium spot and made the move of his career with a clever switch-back to take fourth just beyond the half-distance mark.
Unfortunately, the driver he had just passed cleanly made an ambitious move to regain the place at the next left-hander and spun right in front of Ron; even an ‘emergency stop’ by the American failing to prevent minor contact.
Stopping on the spot before resuming his race, Ron went on to finish fifth, making a superb passing move at the final corner of the race to gain a spot.
He and Duncan are seventh in the points while 2023 Teams’ Champions Greystone GT hold third in this year’s standings.
GT Cup
A late decision put Andrey Borodin and Ed Pead back in the series that yielded three podiums last year and proved a successful hunting ground for the pair and their McLaren 720S GT3 Evo.
Andrey took a career-best second in GT3 in qualifying for Sunday’s Pitstop Race with his best-ever lap of the circuit and then combined with Ed to finish third in GT3.
Lying second early on, a pair of spins during the first half of the race put the #24 McLaren back in the pack, but Andrey had regained third in class by the driver changes.
Once aboad, Ed showed good speed; his laptimes consistently the second-fastest of any GT3 driver across the weekend. He clawed back a sizeable deficit during his stint as he brought the car home third.
That followed a first-lap exit from Saturday’s sprint that resulted in a back-of-the grid start to the first Pitstop Race – which Andrey elected to tackle solo – and another third-place result as he climbed the order throughout the 50 minutes.
Mark McLoughlin, Team Principal, said: “I’m proud of every one of our drivers this weekend, who have all raised their game amid a mix of challenges at the Nurburgring and Silverstone. Ryan and Oli have shown once again that they are the class of the field in the 570S division of the McLaren Trophy Europe while Ron looked racier than I’ve ever seen him. At Silverstone Andrey took a second off his best-ever lap of Silverstone while Ed’s speed was strong for someone who hasn’t raced the McLaren all year and has only driven a handful of laps in testing during the winter. It all bodes extremely well for the rest of the racing season.”
