Team Modena will not be contesting the opening round of
the Avon Tyres British GT Championship at Oulton Park, Cheshire this weekend after complications with the supply of their first Lamborghini Gallardo
in GT3 specification from Reiter Engineering. The team are now targeting the
second round of the series at Donington Park on April 21st- 22nd for their
British GT debut.
"To my great disappointment our Gallardo will not be ready for the first meeting
at Oulton Park," explained Team Modena CEO Graham Schultz, "due to technical and
build complications at Reiter Engineering.
Team Modena will be running two Lamborghini Gallardos in the GT3 class of the
Avon Tyres British GT Championship in 2007. The cars will be run from the
Lamborghini Wycombe workshops overseen by Team Principal Graham Schultz, with
one car competing from the start of the season and the second joining in after
the early rounds. "It's an honour and a privilege for us to the be the first official
Lamborghini dealer to go racing," says Graham, "and we are looking forward to
the British GT season ahead.
We are very
excited by this programme, GT3 and the Gallardo are natural fits with what we do
at Lamborghini Wycombe, and we will be running the cars from there all year."
"The campaign will be another string to our bow," says team co-owner Rik
Bryan, "and it is exciting as the Lamborghini is the perfect car for us with the
Lamborghini Wycombe connection. It is an opportunity for us to show what Team Modena can do with our
automotive, engineering, R&D and race team experience."
"We will definitely be at Donington Park, with Antonio Garcia driving for us,
and that will give us another 10 days to paint and prepare the car ready for
that meeting. I shall be at Oulton Park to support the British GT Championship
next weekend." The GT3
campaign will run alongside Team Modena's Le Mans 24-Hours and Le Mans Series
2007 schedule with their GT1 Aston Martin DBR9 from the same High Wycombe
facility.
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The Lamborghini Gallardo has also arrived in Japan
this year. Team JLOC are running two of the Reiter
Engineering built machines in the GT300 class of the
2007 Super GT Championship. |
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The Lamborghini Gallardo is set to appear on the
English race tracks as Team Modena will contest the
British GT Championship with a pair of the Reiter
Engineering-built GT3 machines. |
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The new GT3 class, which will produce the overall 2007 British GT Champion,
which will feature eight different manufacturers, with another two, Jaguar and
Morgan, due to compete later in the season and this promises to be the most
closely fought championship for many years. There will be further Italian
interest as a pair of Ferrari 430 GT3’s will also contest the 2007 championship, with
Phil Burton and Adam Wilcox in the VRS Motor Finance entered car and the other
driven by Hector Lester and Allan Simonsen. However Simonsen will miss the
opening two races of the season due to a trip to Australia and Lester will be
joined by fellow Ulsterman and reigning British GT Champion Tim Mullen for the
Oulton Park meeting.
Beechdean Motorsport, who had a good first season in British GT, will
also be
entering a Ferrari 360 Modena for team owner Andrew Howard and highly
experienced GT racer Aaron Scott. The team's second Ferrari is ready to race and
may enter the championship later in the season. David Dove is also
competing this year in a Ferrari 360.
The opening round of the
2007 Avon Tyres British GT Championship takes
place at Oulton Park on Saturday 7th April at
17:20, with the second 60-minute race on Monday
9th April at 14:00. The 2007 season will be
held over 14 rounds at 8 meetings all in the UK,
with 2-hour feature races being held at
Snetterton in June and Silverstone in August.
British GT will line up alongside the Lloyds TSB
Insurance British F3 International Series at all
of these meetings, which will also include a
action packed support race programme which will
feature UK Formula Ford, Caterhams, Ginettas and
the Volkswagen Racing Cup.
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