Tuesday 13th April 2010

FIA GT3 European Championship Promises Thrills

Grid boasts 36 entries, 18 teams and four Alpina B6s...

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Alpina's B6 (above) PH's M6 (below)

The FIA has released the official entry list for the 2010 GT3 European Championship which kicks off at Silverstone in support of round 2 of the new GT1 World Championship in less than three weeks.

With ten different models battling for GT3 honours, and 36 cars expected to line-up for each race, it promises to be an exciting season. Here at PH we may be taking a little more interest than usual, thanks to the four Alpina B6 GT3s that are flying the flag for BMW.

Why do we care? Only because we've just taken delivery of a stunning black BMW M6 coupe as the PH test fleet flagship. Oh yes indeedy!

You can't park there mate, 'elf an' safety!

But so as not to appear partisan, we're happy to show you all the GT3 racing machines as per the FIA announcement yesterday. Racing starts as part of the Silverstone Supercar event on the weekend of May 02/03, which will also be the first chance to see international racing on the Arena Complex – the main feature of Silverstone’s new Grand Prix Circuit.

Incidently, the new GT1 cars start their campaign in Abu Dhabi this weekend and you can follow all the latest action online at www.gt1world.com including live streaming of the two 60-minute races from Yas Marina, the organisers tell us.

And in case you were wondering, there'll be no GT2 European Championship this year as the organisers are trying to redefine the category for hybrid-powered racers in future seasons.

The 10 different models racing in the FIA GT3 European Championship are:

Aston Martin DBRS9	Audi R8 LMS
BMW Z4 GT3	BMW Alpina B6 GT3
Corvette Z06R GT3	Ferrari 430 Scuderia
Ford GT	Ford Mustang Marc VDS GT3
Lamborghini Gallardo LP560-4	Porsche 911 GT3 R

*PH disclaimer. These are pre-season pics, so liveries/team colours may be different in the Championship.

[Noble Ox]

Droooooooooooooooooooling

[ellisd82]

Sweeeeeeet!!!

[soad]

Lovely cars there. Big thumbs up from me!

[BanjoMaster]

No Morgans? They pwned all over everything last year at times. But yeah, that's probably about as good a grid as I've ever seen in a top flight sportscar championship! All pretty closely matched too

[Mark_Karting]

soad said:

Lovely cars there. Big thumbs up from me!

+1, looks like a good mix of machinery as well

[ukaskew]

No Morgan Aero Supersport this year? They were by far the best sounding cars last season, and finally had the ability to match the glorious soundtrack.

GT3 is looking like it's on for another very good healthy year anyway, it outperformed it's bigger brother last year quite comfortably in terms of entertainment and racing.

[vintageracer01]

FANTASTIC !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am sure, the Aston, the Ford GT and Mustang, the Corvette and the BMW B6 will have an incredibly thundering engine sound.

[Gold]

No Morgans

[boxsey]

Tickets bought for Silversone and really looking forward to seeing them all in action

[zebedee]

No GT2 championship because of what, sorry?! Reformulating? Electric cars - ha. That made me laugh. Has PH really accepted that story?

It's FIA's loss, the GT2s put on a great display in the Le Mans Series race last weekend.

[Chris-R]

zebedee said:

No GT2 championship because of what, sorry?! Reformulating? Electric cars - ha. That made me laugh. Has PH really accepted that story?

It's FIA's loss, the GT2s put on a great display in the Le Mans Series race last weekend.

Well, that's what they're saying. We're not holding our breath!

http://www.silverstone.co.uk/news/latest-news/FIA-...

[chrisg_s2k]

<drool>
mmmmmmmmmmmm


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VkVrSEB3VyM

</drool>

[XitUp]

Very nice.

What tv channel is this shown on and where can I illegally stream it?

[Rob_R]

Choose your weapon.

GT3 R for me.

[soad]

Lamborghini Gallardo LP560-4 for me.

[MotorUniverse]

PLEEEEEEASE PH, Everysingle one of those pictures must be made into PIC OF THE WEEK.

Absolutely ORGASMIC!

[V8 Vette]

Got my weekenders tickets. I'll be there. Cannot wait !!
Stuff the fuel prices, my V8 will be in the Club car park

[Broady88]

XitUp said:

Very nice.

What tv channel is this shown on and where can I illegally stream it?

All races LIVE on Motors TV. Don't know about streaming but Justin TV seems to manage to have a ton of stuff, probably worth checking out.

[asbojohn]

ukaskew said:

No Morgan Aero Supersport this year? They were by far the best sounding cars last season, and finally had the ability to match the glorious soundtrack.

No seems they had a disagreement with the FIA at Portugal over noise levels and the every changing rules. They are competing in the French GT3 series this season. So hopefully they'll be back better and louder.

[chevronb37]

Looking forward to it. British championship at Oulton Park was a nice warm-up.