Fortec Motorsports has confirmed that Jason Minshaw and Benji Hethrington will continue for the remainder of the 2013 Avon Tyres British GT Championship, and from this weekend will drive together in a Fortec-prepared Mercedes AMG SLS GT3, having competed in the opening round for the team, albeit with different co-drivers.
“Following a very successful first outing at Oulton Park we are delighted to have signed Jason and Benji for the remainder of the 2013 British GT Championship,” said Team Manager Trevor Foster. “Jason and Benji will be paired together from Rockingham onwards and we firmly believe that they will be a very competitive force based on their individual stints during the first event. We are very pleased with our early impressions of the Mercedes AMG SLS GT3 car and having an opportunity to complete a couple of dry days testing since Oulton Park means we are looking forward improving our results at Rockingham.”
Minshaw and Hetherington had contrasting weekends at Oulton. British GT debutant, Minshaw came off a victim in a three-car shunt at turn one of the first race, but race two saw him finish sixth.
“I can do the racing bit, when I’m given a chance! Racing the Mercedes is going to be a big change for me as I have only raced historic cars like Jaguar E-Types before, having wings and grip is a whole new thing for me!” Minshaw admitted.
“I’m loving every minute of it; it’s taking some time to get used to things but we’ll get there. We’ve been testing a lot, and in some previous tests I’ve been a couple of seconds quicker than the other bronze level drivers so that’s promising. Rockingham will be our first chance to show the pace we have and I’m confident for a good result. I’ve not raced on the GT layout before but I’ve raced there with the Historics before and won.”
Young-gun Hetherington is no stranger to the British GT paddock, the 20-year-old contested the championship in 2012, firstly with his brother Freddie in the JMH prepared Nissan GT-R GT3 then racing in the Snetterton and Silverstone rounds with Steve Parish in the Motorbase Porsche 997 GT3 R. Hetherington has popped up in British GT a few times, having raced sporadically through 2009 and 2010 in the GT4 class with some success too.
Fortec will again run a second Mercedes at Rockingham this weekend. Oliver Webb, who is currently contesting the Formula Renault 3.5 series with the team, will be sharing driving duties with Paraguayan racer Danny Candia.
Action begins at Rockingham on Sunday (5th May) at 10am with free practice 1, quickly followed by free practice 2 at 12:25pm. Qualifying takes place on Sunday afternoon between 4:20pm and 4:50pm. After a brief morning warm-up on Monday (6th May) at 10:30am, the two-hour race will get underway at 1:05pm.
Source : Fortec Motorsports