Ferrari Challenge Dealer Team GB Monza Race Report

Saturday 24 March: The Ferrari Challenge Dealer Team GB completed a successful start to the Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli season with an excellent display in Qualifying and Race 1. The team has five cars, with two cars competing under the Team Vertu Racing banner and three cars in Ferrari Challenge Dealer team GB livery, driven by Ferrari clients who are taking part in the world’s most prestigious racing series for gentleman drivers.

The Team Vertu Racing drivers, Nathan Kinch in Car 27 and Jamie Constable in Car 152 qualified in 6th and 7th places, respectively, for Race 1 on Saturday afternoon. Nathan is racing in the Trofeo Pirelli category in a strong and very competitive field of 16 cars driven by some very experienced drivers, while Jamie is competing in the Coppa Shell category which has an incredible 37 cars on the grid.

During the Trofeo Pirelli Race 1 on Saturday, Nathan maintained his position and demonstrated an excellent turn of speed, with a fastest lap of 1’55.299 which was only 8/100ths of a second off the winning speed. Finishing in 6th place in his first Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli race, Nathan was pleased to have one race under his belt in a car which ran in very distinctive livery and is confident he will soon be challenging for podium finishes for Team Vertu Racing.

In the Coppa Shell Race 1, Jamie started well and was able to maintain the same pace as the leaders for the first half of the race, but the intense traffic caused by a packed grid of 37 cars meant he slipped down the field after a couple of spins, finishing in 19th place. For Race 2 on Sunday, Jamie started in 6th place and expected to be able to push further up the field with a car that is clearly competitive and ready to challenge for the lead.

The Ferrari Challenge Dealer Team GB’s three drivers in the Coppa Shell include some new drivers to the series: Daniel Weachter and Peer Slipsager in Car 153, and Yannick Mallegol and Jean Marc Bachelier in Car 154. For Race 1, Daniel Weachter qualified 24th out of the 37, with a very respectable time of 1’57.731 on Monza’s long 5.793km circuit, and for Race 2, 28th with a time of 1’59.227. Yannick Mallegol and Jean Marc Bachelier qualified an excellent 14th for Race 1, with Jean Marc’s very quick time of 1’56.877; Yannick qualified for Race 2 in 34th in his very first Ferrari Challenge race. Peter Bamford in Car 151 is starting his second year as a Ferrari Challenge Dealer Team GB driver and aims to build on his experience which he gained in 2006 to improve on both his qualifying and, crucially, his race finishing positions during the 2007 season.

In the paddock area, the Ferrari Challenge Dealer Team GB also hosted Ferrari clients and VIP guests to the new team hospitality units which really set the standard in the pitlane. In a unique and exciting marketing collaboration with Vertu, KitchenAid and Meridian, the team’s guests were able to spend the weekend in luxury, enjoying the finest Italian hospitality – with exquisite cuisine freshly prepared by KitchenAid’s guest chef, entertained by Meridian Audio’s state-of-the-art home entertainment systems, and provided with an opportunity to see Vertu’s incredible range of luxury, handcrafted mobile phones, including the very appropriate and exclusive limited edition Racetrack Legends Series which feature engravings of historical and significant motor racing circuits – including Monza! – on the phone’s titanium casing.

Sunday 25 March: It was another early start for the Ferrari Challenge Dealer Team GB on Sunday morning, with Nathan Kinch in Car 27 starting on the third row of the Trofeo Pirelli in the distinctive Team Vertu Racing livery for Race 2 of the first weekend’s Luxury Lifestyle Racing, the Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli which started the season at the “Temple of Speed” in Milan.

In contrast to the previous day’s racing activities, Sunday morning in Milan was grey and damp, with Race 2 being declared a Wet race – meaning that the everyone’s qualifying times counted for little in the race because the qualifying sessions were conducted when the sun was shining and the track was dry. Switching to a fresh set of “wet” tyres, developed by Pirelli specifically for the Ferrari Challenge, Nathan battled with the spray caused by the front runners on a very high speed circuit but was never more than 0.5 second of the pace of the leaders, bringing the car home a very respectable 7th place in a difficult race.

The Ferrari Challenge Dealer Team GB was also represented in the Coppa Shell category, with Jamie Constable in Car 152 starting from a similar 6th place on the grid as his Team Vertu Racing team-mate, Nathan Kinch who competes in the Trofeo Pirelli. With a packed grid of 37 cars again for Race 2 on Sunday, Jamie had to contend with even greater amounts of spray, not only from the leading cars he was chasing hard, but also the slower traffic.

In only his second Ferrari Challenge race, Daniel Weachter in Car 153 showed impressive form by quickly moving up from his 28th starting position in Race 2 to finish a very credible 14th in an extremely wet race – with his lap times only 1 second off the leaders around the drenched 5.8km Monza circuit. Daniel quickly managed to get to grips with the 490hp Ferrari F430 Challenge and this bodes well for the team’s home race at Silverstone in early June, one of the fastest circuits on the calendar.

The duo of Yannick Mallegol and Jean Marc Bachelier struggled in the wet conditions but still managed to climb from a starting position of 34th to finish in 27th place and gain some valuable experience, not only on the track, but also in the pit lane as they practice driver changes during the compulsory 1 minute pit stop.

The Ferrari Challenge Dealer Team GB once again hosted several VIP Ferrari clients and guests in the new hospitality unit which was the envy of the paddock, with cookery demonstrations throughout the day from a resident Kitchen Aid chef, entertainment provided courtesy of Meridian Audio and a welcome presentation by Alberto Torres, President of Vertu, to inaugurate the new partnership of the four luxury brands working together to support the world’s most exclusive single-make championship, the Ferrari Challenge Trofeo Pirelli.