The season Finale of the British GT Championship round was held at Donington Park this weekend 5th-6th October. All was to play for as the teams prepared for the two hour race. The top three drivers were separated by half a point. Andrew Howard started the weekend ahead with 107.5 points ahead of Marco Attard and Oliver Bryant both on 107 points. Howard competes in the No 007 Aston Martin while Attard and Bryant both run the No 79 Ecurie Ecosse BMW. The GT4 standings saw Ryan Ratcliffe and Rick Parfitt Jnr in joint first with 146 points ahead of third place Declan Jones, who all run in Ginetta’s.
Thirty two cars completed the line up for the rolling start. No 8 lead from the start, followed by No. 32 Fisken Porsche with No 18 Ferrari in third. Thirteen minutes into the race No 31 Trackspeed Porsche spun on track and this meant that Nick Tandy who was running fifth in the championship now had lost his chance to take the championship title. The first safety car of the race was deployed onto the track whilst the Porsche was recovered.
The title contenders were running in third and fourth, BMW and Aston Martin respectively and with half an hour completed, the No 32 Fisken Porsche spun at Goddard and dropped back from second into eighth position.
Andrew Howard No 007 overtook No 79 BMW as the two cars fought for third position which allowed No 25 United Autosport Audi to reduce the gap and get ahead of No 79. No 9 McLaren also overtook No 79 BMW to join the battle for third. Andrew Howard fought to keep his third position with No 25 Audi trying to overtake at several points on the track. He started to pull a slight gap as the fourth position No 25 was under attack by No 9 McLaren. The McLaren soon took the position and No 25 dropped back into fifth.
The number 25 McLaren also managed to overtake the No 007 Aston Martin to gain third position. The Aston dropped back to fifth just slightly ahead of title contender No 79 BMW. With just over an hour remaining, the pit window was just about to open.
As the pit lane opened one of the first to pit was the No 79 BMW, the No 8 which was leading the race also pitted early on. Drive through penalties were issued for car numbers 2, 8, 13, 33 and 80 for overtaking whilst under yellow flag.
At the half way point the race was lead by No 8, No 25, No 18, No 9, No 007, No 79.
There was another drive through penalty issued against No 8. This then resulted in No 25 taking the lead ahead of No 8. But the No 8 BMW dropped into third behind No 18 Ferrari. With only half an hour remaining there were many drivers who could take the championship win.
No 44 received a stop go penalty who was driving in second in GT4 championship behind Declan Jones No 43. No 44 at this point was currently being won by No 44 Ryan Ratcliffe and Rick Parfitt Jnr and it was unknown at this point who would take the GT4 Championship.
No 9 who was running in third was given a drive through penalty and this resulted in them dropping down to sixth and moving the No 007 up into fourth. With just under fifteen minutes to go the second place runner No 44 was under attack by No 53 Wilson in the Complete Racing Aston Martin. This fight wouldn’t affect the GT4 Championship though.
As the No 25 Audi driven by Matt Bell took the checkered flag he finished ahead of No 18 Ferrari. Third was No 32 Porsche and Fourth to No 007 Aston Martin. This result meant that the British GT 2013 Championship was won by Andrew Howard who races in the Beechdean No 007 Aston Martin.
The GT4 race was won by Declan Jones in his Century Motorsport Ginetta G50 however his win did not help him to secure the GT4 Championship win that went to the second place finisher of the race Ryan Ratcliffe and Rick Parfitt Jnr who lead by 2 points overall.
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