The SRO Motorsports Group – promoters of the British GT Championship have announced a couple of changes to the calendar for the 2011 season.
The opening weekend of the year – April 23-25 at Oulton Park – was initially planned to be a two hour race with a refuelling stop. However, that format will now be seen for the first time in 2011 in the June meeting on the Brands Hatch GP circuit.
Oulton Park will now host two one hour races – the traditional British GT race format. The changes for the Brands Hatch weekend will be the reverse – a two hour race replacing the double-header format.
“Firstly,” says championship manager Benjamin Franassovici, “the Brands Hatch Grand Prix circuit is ideally suited to a two-hour endurance race, and secondly we decided that it would fascinating to see the new time penalty system in operation at the first meeting of the year.”
Under the new system the success ballast used to balance the performance of cars in past years it replaced by a scheme of time penalties added to the driver change pitstops. A car which scored well in the previous race having to spend a longer minimum time in the pits.
The Oulton Park weekend will give fans an instant chance to see the new system in action the results of the year's first race being translated into the first penalties of the year for race two.
Revised Avon Tyres British GT Championship Calendar
April 23-25 Oulton Park 2 x 1hr races
May 14-15 Snetterton 300 2hr race
June 18-19 Brands Hatch GP 2hr race
July 8-9 Spa-Francorchamps 2 x 1hr races
Septemeber 3-4 Rockingham 2 x 1hr races
September 24-25 Donington Park GP 3hr race
October 7-9 Silverstone GP 2hr race
