We came to Mugello thinking we still had a slim chance to win the Drivers Championship and we thought that there was no chance to win the Constructors Championship anymore.

Testing went pretty well, although it was changing conditions we ended up 7th and 9th in both the sessions. We tried various different settings in the wet and tried to work on a race setup, as we thought it would be wet for the weekend!

Phil (Keen) drove the first qualifying session as he was slightly slower in practice. He went out about five minuets into the session, to try and set a time, the track was getting dryer and dryer each lap. We took the risk to send him out late and we very nearly got caught out as there were several red flags, meaning that with three minuets left on the clock, we did not even have a time in! So Phil had a 1 lap shot at quail and he did very well considering the circumstances, putting the car in p9 for race one.

I did the second qualifying as usual and went out immediately on wets to set a banker lap time. The team told me over the radio to pit for slicks, but I was hesitant at doing it as the track was still very damp! Nevertheless I came in a put slicks on, which proved to be the perfect time to do it. It took 3 laps for them to come up to temperature, which left me 3 laps to set good times and I was by far the fastest car on track. When the other cars slicks got up to temperature, the battle was on, with me and Claus Ludwig fighting for pole position in the dying moments of quail. I piped the multiple Le Mans and FIA GT winner by just 0.189 of a second to secure my first ever pole position in FIA GT3!

In race one, Phil had to start the car in 9th on the grid in the torrential rain and I mean monsoon conditions! He dropped a few places at the start because he just couldn’t see where he was going, but after two laps he started to push and before we knew it he was up to p9 again. Then he got up to p5 and then he caught the next bunch and got up to p2! He drove amazingly and caught the huge gap to the leading Ascari of Ben Collins, but couldn’t get past him due to the visibility. We decided to bring him in early and change over to me and try to get some clear track. I got in and noticed that he was not joking about there being no visibility! The windscreen was all misted up, so you couldn’t see a thing, add the spray of 40 odd GT3 cars and it was almost impossible to drive. The team came over the radio and said the leading Ascari is 20 seconds in front, I pushed hard and caught him up and passed him with ease. The Porsche was going great in the wet, even though it was aquaplaning at over 140mph in a straight line! I just tried to follow the white lines around the track and finish the race. I was loosening my belts down the straight to try and wipe the screen and had to lean over to try and see where the track was out of a little gap at the bottom of the windscreen!! Andy Thompson in another Ascari caught me slightly at the end, but I had it under control and came across the line to secure our second victory in a row! Even better news is that the championship leading Viper of Borhauser finished down in 8th position and the second place Viper finished in 3rd. This meant that I had taken over the lead of the FIA GT3 championship with 1 race to go!

I started race two in the best possible position, P1. All I had to do was finish in front of the 2nd and 3rd place Vipers and I would be champion. I got a good start and held the lead up to the first corner, but Claus Ludwig cut across me and took the lead! Only 3 corners later the hugely experienced driver threw it off into the gravel on his own and handed me back the lead! My team mate Paul made an awesome start and was up to P2 behind me and acted as a very nice cushion from the other cars. I put my head down and pulled a 3 second gap from Paul in a few laps, but Andy Thompson was on a charge, with his car working very well in the damp conditions. He caught me pretty quickly and I was not about to defend him and risk having a crash, after all I only needed to finish ahead of the Vipers, although it is always nice to win! I followed Andy for the rest of my stint, just keeping him in sight before coming into hand over to Phil. We had a good pit stop and Phil soon caught and passed the slower driver Allison in the Ascari. He then just took it easy out front, not taking any risks and keeping the gap at about 7 seconds. He crossed the line in first position just over 8 seconds clear of the Ascari, to give me victory in the overall driver’s championship and Porsche championship! Points from the other two cars in the team also provided all of us with the Constructors championship as well, which was amazing as it was almost impossible to win that coming into this round!

It was just a magical weekend with us getting Pole Position, two race wins and 3 championships! Everyone in the team worked so hard to achieve this goal and we did the clean sweep of everything.

I need to say a HUGE thank you to Tech 9 Motorsport, Phil Hindley, Dan, Ross, Phil Keen, Dimitris, all my family and main sponsor SG Hambros, as without any of these people this would not be possible. I really can’t thank these guys enough for this and I hope to have lots more success with the Tech 9 crew in the future.

Next year, who knows, I am open to do anything at the moment. The likely step would either be into GT1, GT2 or Porsche Supercup. I will wait and see what offers come my way and how it all pans out over the winter.

Sean Edwards, driver of the No. 9 Tech 9 Porsche 997 in the FIA GT3 European Championship discusses his last outing at Dijon – a weekend which would turn out to be his best of the year, with a breakthrough win in the second race of the weekend.

We came to Dijon knowing that it was going to be a struggle, as you need downforce at the track. So we were looking to score some good points. That was all we could hope for.

Testing went well as Phil (Keen) had never driven the track or car, so he did some slow laps in the first session learning both. I then got in the car at the end with a qualifying setup too see what time it could do and we ended up 2nd.

The second session we concentrated on race setup, trying to have consistent times. We drove for the whole hour on one set of tyres, changing drivers half way through. Due to that, we were down the order a bit (11th or so), but we had a good race pace of high 23’s/low 24’s.

Phil drove the first qualifying session as he was the slower driver in testing, but he really struggled to find a gap and set his fastest time on his 7th lap, when the new tyres had gone way past their best. It was still good enough for 10th on the grid (9th due to Anthony Reid’s blown engine forcing him to start from the back).

I did the second qualifying session and got a one free lap to begin with and did a 1.21.7, but the Motec was flashing fuel pressure warning. The team gave me one more lap to better my time and then come into the pits to park it, incase the engine got damaged! I managed to find a clear space and got a slightly better lap of 1.21.6, which was good for P2 at that time. As the session wore on I dropped down to P6, but we were at the sharp end nevertheless.

In Race One, Phil had to start as he was slower in qualifying and he made a great start from 9th to 6th in the first two laps! He couldn’t get past the Vipers ahead, so he just hung onto them for his stint. The Aston caught and passed him for 6th, so he dropped to 7th. He came into the pits and handed over to me. We were up to 3rd by the time everyone had pitted and got sorted out. But then we were told we had to serve a Stop/Go for being 0.7 tenth of a second too fast out of the pits! We couldn’t argue, but we lost thirty seconds dropping down to 10th overall (still the 1st Porsche). We had lost and chance to get decent points. The car was handling quite badly in the cooler conditions to cap it all off, with very bad understeer (running high 24’s low 25’s, a second off what we were doing in the testing stint). We wouldn’t have been able to hold 3rd place, but we worked out that we should have finished 5th, but the stop/go really hampered us.

In Race 2, we softened the front roll bar and lowered the front ride height to cure some of the understeer. I started the race and it was total chaos with a Viper jumping the start and taking out the Corvette beside me, which took out the Aston behind it, which took out another Viper! Luckily I managed to get through it and got up to 4th by the first corner. The safety car came out, as those 3 cars were in the pit wall. When it came back in, I got a good run on the championship leading Viper and was down the inside for the double left out the back, he squeezed me off the track, but I was not going to back out and went across the curb and down the inside on 2 wheels with a bit of contact! From then on I just defended like mad from him, as his car was a lot faster. We both caught the 2nd place Viper as I continued to block the Viper behind. We knew that the 2nd drivers in the Vipers were slightly slower and that Phil maybe could get past them.

I came into the pits at the last possible minute (34th minute) right behind the 2nd placed Viper and I handed over to Phil. We saw the chance to get past the Viper in the pits and hold him up at the end of pitlane (65 seconds mandatory in the pits, but nothing saying you can’t slow at the end of it for the time to run out, and other cars canno’t overtake you in the pits!). So he came out in 2nd place, but the Viper got back past him a lap later. Phil then got back past the Viper in the same lap again! He then caught the leading Viper and took about 4 laps to find a way past, but when he did he started to pull a bit of a lead. The Aston Martin was on a charge in 5th and soon made his way up into 2nd place with 3 laps to go. The traffic was holding us up bad, but Phil held them all at bay and finally crossed the line with a 2 second gap (With the win!).

In no way were we expecting to win a race here at Dijon, as the other cars ARE so much faster! But we did it finally and it’s great. Onto Mugello in two weeks for the championship showdown, the Porsche should go well there!

Furthermore, the Viper of Patrick Bornhauser was found to have illegal brakes and was disqualified from race one at Dijon and they raced under appeal in race two. Their points are strictly provisional, but we will try to beat them on track and not wait until the courts settle it.

Thanks to the whole Tech9 Motorsport team: Phil Hindley, Dan, Ross, Phil Keen, Guy and Daphne (my parents) and my main sponsor SG Hambros for this amazing weekend and victory! Everyone did a perfect job all weekend and we achieved the almost impossible, thanks again too everyone involved.

The second round of the FIA European GT3 championship was held at the classic Spa-Francorchamps track in the depths of the Arden valley. This picturesque track is one of the most demanding tracks in the World, Sean Edwards has written a full race report on the weekend’s events below.

Qualifying for Spa went really well, with Dimitris doing a solid job to put us p9 in Quali one and I put us p4 in quail 2, over 2 seconds clear from the next Porsche! This was later to become P3 as Tiff Needell could not start the race due to his Aston being trashed from the first race smash.

Race 1 and Dimitris started it, he was on a charge in the first 4 laps, coming from p9 to p4! He had a good battle with 2 vipers and then came in to hand the car over to me. We got the car out in P4 behind the safety car and we discussed what I had to do over the radio. I had to get past the Dodge ahead of me to have any chance of keeping up with the others. On the restart the Aston went by the Viper into Eau Rouge and I got a good run on him down the straight and passed him into Les Combe, securing 3rd place.

I followed the Aston for the rest of the race, just about keeping up with it, but it was still just to fast. The red flag came out with 4 min to go and the team told me that the Aston had not stopper for the right amount of time in their pit stop and were going to get a penalty, so we were promoted to p2! It was such a great result after the disappointment of Oschersleben and the Tech 9 crew had done a mega job to get us there! Although the Dodge’s were still too fast for us to catch, we were happy to be back at the sharp end.

Race 2 came around and we had a real chance to have another good result, I started the race in p3 and I knew I had to take advantage of the Porsche on cold tyres. I dived down the inside of the race winning Dodge, but it was too ambitious and I had to go straight on across the grass into Les Combe! I got back o in P3 and settled into a rhythm. I could just about keep up with the Corvette and the Viper in the first 4 laps, but when the tyres started to get to hot on the Porsche, the other cars were gone. Because they have so much down force, they can do fast times consistently in the race, and don’t overheat their tyres. Where as the Porsche does not have much down force and relies heavily on its tyres for grip, which overheat throughout the race.

I just tried to be consistent and keep the other cars at bay, which the Aston of Zani was not happy about and tried to push me off! Silly move and he punctured his own radiator and was out of the race. I came into the pits and handed the race over to Dimitris, as he came out the 2 cars had a huge crash at the top of Eau Rouge and the safety car was out for the rest of the race bar 1 lap. Dimitris did a great job on that lap and snatched 2nd place with an awesome move down the inside of the Corvette and he held onto 2nd place until the line.

It really was a great weekend for us and I have to say a huge thank you and congratulations to the whole Tech 9 Motorsport team and especially too Phil Hindley (Team Manager), Dan Fitzsimmons (N1 Engineer), Ross Patterson (N2 Engineer) and Giannoulis Kafetzis (Data Dude/Dimitris translator)! These guys put in so much hard work to get us here and we couldn’t have done it without them, thanks to the whole team once again!

We are now P2 overall in the championship and leading the Porsche manufacturers championship! Dijon is going to be a tough weekend, but I hope we can score some solid points and keep the championship alive.””

The second round of the FIA European GT3 Championship was held at the Oschersleben Motorpark in Germany, it was not a good weekend for Sean and the team, but he has written a brief race report below.

“”After the Silverstone result we were looking for a win at Oschersleben. But when we got there it proved not to be a Porsche circuit at all, but suited the Dodge vipers! We were around 3 seconds of the Dodge’s pace and it was not looking good. We only managed 19th and 21st position in both the qualifying sessions.

The race was looking bleak and the best we could hope for was a Porsche win, but in race I didn’t even get to drive the car. As just before the pit stop Dimitris was running P1 in the Porsche class and P13 overall, when he got abruptly taken out by the spinning Ferrari of Hector Lestor! That blew the radiator and ended the race there and then.

Race 2, I started and got the car up to P1 in Porsche and P9 overall, I sat most of the race behind a gaggle of Dodge vipers and a Masarati. When I handed over there was a miscommunication between Dimitris and the team, therefore loosing us 15 seconds in the pits. We dropped to P2 in the Porsche class, but Dimitris fought his was back past and into the Porsche and finished P11 overall, we could not do anymore.

If the FIA didn’t do something drastic we would be uncompetitive at Spa also, but luckily they did and the dodge was restricted even more, but still 1 to 1.5 seconds faster than us!””

The first round of the FIA GT3 European Championship was held at the prestegious Silverstone Grand Prix track in Northamtonshire, Sean Edwards has written a race report below.

“”We came to this weekend not knowing what to expect really. Were the FIA going to get the balancing right, was the Porsche going to be competitive and who was going to be the competition.

Testing went well, we ended up 3rd and 10th in the 2 sessions, it was a good start, but we still didn’t know is anyone was sandbagging or not.

We came into Saturday still not knowing what to expect, except that it was going to be very difficult to get a clear lap in qualifying! Our strategy was to wait for the first 10
min and then go out; therefore most people would be back into the pits. We were the last cars to go out, but it still proved very difficult to get a free lap. I was held up on my first two flying laps and luckily I got a quick one in on my 4th lap, but by that point the tyres were past their best. Luckily it was still good enough for p5 only .3 off pole.

My co driver Dimitris did the 2nd quail and also struggled with traffic, but still managed to snatch p9 with only a few min of the session to go, this left our team all together in 8th, 9th and 10th.

Then came the race, which we were quietly confident about as long as it stayed dry! But about 2 hours before the race the heavens opened and I got in the car and went to the grid on wets. With the 3 min board lifted I got a call over the radio that said the FIA have just told us that Dimitris is meant to be starting the race not you! So I jumped out of the car and Dimitris quickly put on his suit and helmet and got into the car with about 1 min to the green flag! The FIA had forgotten to mention in the briefing that the fastest driver out of the two in quail has to start the 2nd race, which was nice of them…

The race got underway and I was still very confused at this point to why I was not in the car. Dimitris made a good start from p5 and was p3 at the end of lap 1, he made a move for p3 into Abbey on lap 2, but Hector Lester closed the door on him, resulting in them both spinning. Luckily Dimitris recovered back in 8th place and then went on a charge back through the field to get 2nd place before he handed over to me in the pit stop. We changed to slicks in the pit stop and I went on my way, unfortunately Dimitris forgot to put the car into N and left it in 2nd gear, which meant a stall in the pits for me, with about 7 seconds being lost.

When I got back on track the team said I was p9 over the radio and they said to push 100% for the remainder of the race, as they predicted it would be a close finish. I pushed really hard and finally found myself in 1st place with 15 minuets to go. The team came over the radio with about 12 minuets to go and said that Simmonsen was catching me and was only 7 seconds behind! So I was pushing very hard, but the marshals were not helping, by displaying absolutely no blue flags to the back markers. I was getting blocked by back markers and even got hit twice, but it was not their fault as they didn’t know I was leading the race. Simmonsen eventually caught me with 3 laps to go and when I got cut of by a Dodge viper going round Woodcote. This meant that he got his nose down the inside and went past into Copse, we exchanged a bit of paint work but it was a good pass. For the next 3 laps it was him being held up by the back markers now, but I could not find a way back through and I had to settle for 2nd place.

Edwards/Deverikos P2 overall, P1 Porsche, Fastest Lap 1.58.647
Murphy/Splunteren P7 overall, P3 Porsche, Fastest Lap 2.02.697
Bryant/Dumarey P9 overall, P4 Porsche, Fastest Lap 2.00.067

The second race was on Sunday and I had to start it in 9th place. It was a hard call on the weather, it had stopped raining, but the track was still very wet. The Scuderia Ecosse weather station said it would dry out. We opted to start on wets with more of a dry setup (stiffer car). I got a good start and was up to p6 on lap one. But then it started to rain again and the Porsche was no match for the Vipers or Ferrari’s. There was nothing I could do about them passing me, they had so much grip they could take dry lines in the wet and still get a better exit out of the corners! I battled on and handed the car over to Dimitris in about 9th place, but unfortunately on his 3rd lap out he spun and stalled. This lost us about 30 seconds and we dropped back to 21st place, he battled hard to get back up and ended up 14th at the end. We did make the wrong choice on setup, which made the car very hard to drive, but this race was always going to be a gamble and this time it did not pay off.

Murphy/Splunteren P7 overall, P1 Porsche, Fastest Lap 2.15.153
Bryant/Dumarey P10 overall, P2 Porsche, Fastest Lap 2.16.295
Edwards/Deverikos P14 overall, P3 Porsche, Fastest Lap 2.15.425

“It was a good start to the championship for us and I hope we can carry this performance on throughout the championship! Oscherslaben is going to be a good track for the Porsche and we are looking good to compete for the win there.”