The start of the 2007 season is well and truly underway !

Sean Edwards and the Tech 9 crew have recently returned back from round 1 of the FIA GT Championship at Zhuhai in China.

Team boss Phil Hindley reflects on the trip ‘ Zhuhai was a fascinating experience for all of us involved. For me personally having never visited the far-east, it was a great event, well promoted by the SRO, and a fantastic crowd greeted an incredible race.

It was tough logistically to have the first event as a fly-away, also as FIAGT virgins, the Tech 9 crew adapted very well to working out of flight cases and we were not short of anything over the course of the weekend. In fact we had a great garage layout after local co-operation from fellow Porsche racer Matthew Marsh, and his colleague Johnson. This was an invaluable assistance, and our No.1 engineer Steve Hagger (who has visited Zhuhai on a number of occasions) ensured that we were all pointing in the right direction !.

The free practice sessions were rather difficult, the wet-dry conditions played havoc, and true to form matching our conditions during pre-season European testing, as soon as the green light signalled pit-lane open, it started to rain !

We have made some fairly major changes to our Porsche 997 RSR, having ditched the standard fitment Sachs dampers, and reverted to our trusted partner Moton Suspension Technology. Jerome Van Gool (owner of Moton BV, Holland) supported us in China, having flown in directly from Sebring !, a big thank you to Jerome for his commitment to support our team with the latest version of his 4-way damper.

We had previously run in wet conditions at Nogaro, France so had a good base set-up, and this resulted in a car that was well balanced and suited the conditions. Sean Edwards was out early in the session and was comfortably setting top 3 times in class at this stage.

Free Practice 2 finished with a comfortable P4 in class, and both drivers settling into the circuit and reporting a very balanced car, which was encouraging news.

Qualifying, we decided to select the Michelin ‘soft’ compound tyre. It was frustrating that with a lack of consistent dry testing, the tyre engineers did not have sufficient data to confirm that the correct choice was made. With the 2007 regulations stating that the race start must use 3 of your qualifying tyres, it is crucial to make the correct decision.

Sean secured a credible P7 in qualifying, pipped only by 1/100th of a second by the other Michelin shod 997 of Ebimotors. Leo also ran in the qual session to get some dry running, and was amazed at the grip level and balance of the car, so he had a good feeling for the start of the race.

The grid assembled for the race, an incredible crowd had gathered in the grandstand across from us, and performing dragons and ‘drift cars’ entertained the crowds that were eagerly awaiting the ‘Main Event’.

Our strategy for the race, was for Sean to start, then Leo drive the middle stint, with Sean completing the final stage of the race.

As the race began, Sean made an incredible start and forced his way through the opening corners to settle into P2 !, and lot of elbowing ensued on the next few laps, and quite heavy contact was made between our car and another Porsche (thought we were supposed to fight the Ferraris !) driven by Marc Basseng, the RSR stood up well to the impact though, and Basseng retired with suspension damage.

Sean settled down to produce a fine drive, and held station in P2 behind Kirkaldy (Ferrari 430) who was disappearing off into the distance at incredible pace. Another 430, the AF Corse car of Dirk Muller managed to force through after around 30 minutes that dropped us to P3, but having decided to capitalise on a clear track, we decided to run Sean a long first stint, that saw us retake the lead of the race at the hour mark.

Such a strong start to the race was a dream, but that dream was to be shattered with a jammed left rear wheel nut during our pit-stop. The crew worked frantically to remove the nut, but we lost a lap with the problems, then fate struck a cruel blow with a safety car three laps after we had pitted, that lost us another lap as the teams that had stopped earlier gained a ‘free’ stop over us.

Leo spent a frustrating period sat at the head of the train directly behind the safety car for much of his stint, then Sean resumed with 20 minutes remaining to run to the flag.

P6 in class was reward for all the hard work of the crew, and the 3 points gained will certainly kick-start our season, for the anticipation of the journey ahead of us.

To summarise the weekend, the pace of our car is there, we set a 1.37.037 on the final lap of the race, compared with fastest lap in class of 1.36.831. This is very encouraging, and had we not had the jammed wheelnut and the unfortunate timing of the safety car, then a possible P4 was definitely within our grasp. The competition at this level is fierce, the combination of Pro drivers, and very successful and experienced teams is a welcome environment for us to operate and achieve the goals that we have set ourselves’.

Sean Edwards made a rare appearance in British GT again. Piers Maserati wanted him to produce some data for their new drivers and set a base time. Sean was comfortably faster, around 9 tenths faster than Ed Morris and 1.3 seconds faster than James Littlejohn, round the short Silverstone National track.

“It was nice to get back in a cup car again, but it felt like a boat compared to the RSR! I am just here helping out Tech9 and their new drivers. I set a decent enough time in 4 laps, as I have never done this configuration in a Porsche.” Said Sean.

Tech 9 got some more valuable testing miles in before the opening round of the FIA GT championship in China. The main aim was to give Leo as much seat time as possible, to get him up to speed with the new Porsche.

The team changed their dampers to Moton and have the owner and chief engineer of Moton, Jerome Van Gool, working on their car for the season. “The Moton’s are working really well and Jerome is superb at putting my feedback about the car, into the setup of the car. The dampers worked superbly in the wet conditions as well, we were 1.5 seconds than the BMS Porsche with Collard in” Sean said.

The team only took part in session 1 of day two, as they took time out to prepare the car for Zuhai. The car had to be flown out just 4 days after the test.

Sean Edwards and Leo Machitski had the chance to really see what the new Porsche 997 RSR could do, in the first official FIA GT test of the year. Sean impressed everyone, setting the early pace for GT2 and being right up at the front by the end of day one. Leo was still getting to grips with the whole concept of the Porsche’s weird handling characteristics, comparing to his Aston Martin of last year.

Day two, Leo spent most of the testing time in the car and eventually pushed a little to hard and lost the car at the infamous Paribolica corner. He backed it into the gravel, just scraping the tyres wall. With the flat floor of the Porsche, the car acted like a bucket and was full of gravel. It took the team 3 hours to rid it of the gravel and it put everyone on the back foot missing the second session of the day, which was the fastest. Leo said “I tried to take more speed into Paribolica than Sean and it was obviously too much as I just lost the back end and couldn’t catch it in time!”

Subsequently Sean had to do his new tyre run at the end of day, when the track was not at it’s best, but still Sean posted a respectable time. He commented “The car felt really bad on the brakes, we have not had much time to tune the setup today and the new tyre run was a waste of time really. But we were happy with day one’s performance and hope to carry it over to Nogaro in a few weeks time”

A bright but frosty Brands Hatch today (February 7) was the venue for the shakedown of Tech 9 Motorsport’s brand new Porsche 911 GT3-RSR, driven by the team’s 2007 pairing, Leo Machitski and Sean Edwards. The 2006 British and FIA GT3 Champions – Machitski in the UK, Edwards in Europe – have come together to take on the challenges of the next step up the GT ladder.

The first images shows Leo Machitski setting off for the first time, then completing the first lap ever by the car. That was run on the wet tyres which are customarily fitted to new race cars.

“The target today was simply to put 200 kms on the car and bed everything in,” commented team owner Phil Hindley. “The car ran beautifully, as you would expect. Porsche got us into an early build slot so that we could shake down and then test the car before it goes to Zhuhai, for the start of the FIA GT Championship.”

Leo Machitski was the first man to sample the Porsche, and although he was restricted to 6,000 revs. initially (then 7,000 – the flat-six revs to 9,000 once everything is bedded in), he came away with a very favourable impression of the new GT2 car.

“I’m quite tall, but it’s very comfortable, and everything is where you want it to be,” he commented. “It was very tempting to squeeze the throttle, and despite the cold weather, it was very hard to go slowly. I can start to feel the excitement already.”

Having two GT3 Champions in the car is a real asset for the team: Phil Hindley (right) explains how at least part of the arrangement came about.

“Stephane Ratel and I talked about the project at the end of last year, and he was very keen to see the FIA GT3 Champion step up to GT2. He suggested a package to support us, and SRO added to the budget, to help Sean. Part of Sean’s reward for winning the European GT3 Championship is a factory tyre deal with Michelin, which means 40 sets of tyres for this year.

“That’s very significant for a team like this: every penny counts and we run the team very frugally. I believe the same offer will be made to the 2007 GT3 Champion.”

Hindley added that it is “crucial that we have a good season. The top two cars in the two classes (GT1 and GT2) are offered a Le Mans entry for the following year. Our long term aim is for Leo to race at Le Mans, so we’re looking to build on what the two drivers achieved in 2006. It’s fantastic to have the two GT3 Champions racing together.”

The Tech 9 plan for 2007 also includes a new group of young drivers racing in the FIA GT3 Championship, with the aim of moving some of them into GT2 in 2008. Phil Hindley is very keen to extend his team’s run of four consecutive GT titles (in British GTs, and then in Europe in 2006).

“We’re very close to having four seats filled in the three European GT3 cars,” adds Phil Hindley, “so we’ll only have two left. We’re also close to announcing our driver pairing for the British GT3 Championship.”

Sean Edwards experienced the Tech 9 ‘championship touch’ in 2006, and describes Phil Hindley as “so dedicated to what he does. He’s completely committed to winning. He’s not much fun at the track because he’s so focused on what he’s doing, but he’s very different away from the circuit.”

Edwards was remarkably relaxed before he sampled the new Porsche, but this was a routine (and totally trouble-free, as expected) shakedown. The real challenges will come as these two take on the likes of Emmanuel Collard and Matteo Malucelli in another GT3-RSR, plus a whole fleet of Ferraris, beginning at Zhuhai on March 25.

Leo Machitski is looking forward to a year in which he can develop his skills in the GT2 Porsche, but will also be racing the Barwell Motorsport Aston Martin DBR9 in certain Le Mans Series races.

“That will stand him in good stead for the Porsche,” remarks Phil Hindley, “because he’ll be able to experience the extra downforce of a GT1 car.”