2018 China GT Half-season digest
China GT’s summer break is here. After 6 rounds of races, the drivers and team personnel will take a break from a flurry of actions while we take stock of what has happened in the first half of the 2018 season.
GT4 – Battle of the titans
If it seemed that the McLaren team was running away with the championship early in the season in 2017, 2018 is anything but. David McIntyre is locked in an intense title fight with Aston Martin AMR’s Ryan Liu and Jack Mitchell, separated by merely two points.
David McIntyre started the season with fellow gentleman driver Dong Liang in the #570 Winning Team McLaren 570S, in the iconic McLaren orange livery. Initially, the British marque looked to be on the back foot, struggling with tyre blistering issues; but the team quickly got its mojo back with support from McLaren GT and the arrival of factory driver Charlie Fagg in Zhejiang. Despite the unlucky timing of a Safety Car in Round 3, the Briton clawed back GT4 lead with one victory and three second-place finishes. He currently has 101 championship points under his name.
China Equity AMR’s Jack Mitchell and Ryan Liu are trailing McIntyre by two points. The young Briton is a 2017 recruit and an experienced Aston Martin campaigner, repeatedly vaulting the #618 from the back of the grid to podium finishes, including two wins.
Thomas Ashton is dovetailing his GTC and GT4 commitment, partnering with Lo Sze Ho and Shi Liang in the #86 Xtreme Motorsports KTM X-bow. His two victories and a P2 finish have promoted him to third in the GT4 classification with 82 points.
Winning Team’s Dong Liang could have been higher in the standings, having scored three P2 finishes alongside McIntyre and a P3 with Ben Rouget. However, he was forced to watch from the sideline in Zhejiang when his #720 McLaren broke down during practice. The upcoming Shanghai race could be a turning point for the Chinese driver – that’s where he scored the first win after the summer break this time last year.
Xtreme Motorsports’ Lo Sze Ho is in fifth place with 62 points, despite missing the Zhejiang races.
Next in line is K2C Motorsports Ginetta shared by Kenny Chung and Sennan Fielding, who joined China GT since Round 3 and have 52 points.
Fist Team AAI’s Kevin Chen and Ivan Lee had suffered two DNFs so far, which consigned them to seventh position in the standings. The BMW M4 has taken the first GT4 pole position in 2018, and finished on the podium twice. So the pace is there for the Taiwanese star to challenge the British brands ahead.
Despite showing good straight-line speed, Team Lotus’ Dominic Ang and Anthony Chan has been ruing mechanical failures throughout the season. With 37 points, they are currently sharing eighth position with Winning Team’s Charlie Fagg.
Fagg edges teammate Benjamin Rouget by 2 points; the latter took to the track in the first four rounds in the #540 McLaren.
This is followed by a number of one-off appearances, namely Naomi Zhang and Martin Rump in the Audi GT4, Eric Wong and Sam Lok in the Lotus Evora and Shi Liang in the KTM.
Raph Lai started his rookie season in the #540 Winning Team McLaren alongside Frenchman Rouget. He bagged a P4 and P6 finish but unfortunately a crash in Zhejiang meant he had to miss the remaining three races. He stands in P12 with 20 points under his belt.
Round up the top 20 are:
P13 – Yu Zhao, China Equity AMR, 18 pts
P14 – David Pun, China Equity AMR, 16 pts
P15 – Zhang Dasheng & Shen Cheng, China Equity AMR, 14 pts
P16 – Andy Yan & James Tang, TRC Team, 12 pts
P17 – Bill O’Brien, China Equity AMR, 10 pts
P18 – Zhang Fangxuan, China Equity AMR, 8 pts
P19 – Yuan Tingting, China Equity AMR, 3 pts
P20 – Martin Byford & Robert Webb, Team Lotus, 0 pt
Winning Team and China Equity AMR also share the spoils on the teams’ championship front, with the former slightly ahead at 137 points against AMR’s 129. Xtreme Motorsports, Team Lotus, K2C Motorsports, Fist Team AAI, KINGS Racing and TRC Team are further down with fewer than 90 points.
