2024 Season Review
After finally coming down from the high of a well-deserved and long-awaited win at the ‘Battle of Brands’, I have had time to cast my mind back over this 2024 season. When I look back on this season I am reminded of all the highs and lows, all the setup changes, all the brake pads and discs changed over the weekends, but most important of all, how proud I am to say I’ve completed my second season in British GT (whilst also finishing P4 in the Pro-Am championship might I add!!).
Looking back to media day at the start of the year, I would’ve said it’s a long shot to get where we are standing now, but through all the on-track battles and consistent hard work, I’d say the result we’ve achieved this year is nothing short of deserving.
The season started off tough at Oulton Park with multiple unknowns: new team, new car, new co-driver; with British GT and Ginetta’s media days being the only testing the Ginetta G56 GT4 EVO had prior to this round, we knew it could be a challenging weekend. However, ignoring any obstacles that occurred, my pace was good throughout, and screen time was also good as it just so happened that Race 1 entailed a relentless and thoroughly enjoyable battle with what would be the eventual GT4 champion Zac Meakin.
From Silverstone onwards we were working with a new engineer, Ryan, who had stepped in to hopefully re-shape and level up the team; Donington 1 really showed us our first taste of this elevation. It didn’t start off treating us well however, as we had struggled all weekend with overheating brakes which ultimately lead to the issue in qualifying causing us to start from the back in the race. This setback did not hound our spirits though as Ryan believed we had good pace and knew we could work towards something good. At the end of the day, we managed to avoid joining the large number of cars in the gravel at Redgate, played our cards correctly and managed to hold on at the end to secure a P3 result in the Pro-Am class.
Going off the back of a good result to a track I’d never been to before, Spa, we were feeling uplifted, both myself and the team and had confidence that the results would improve from here on out. This was proving to be true so far, topping FP1 and showing good pace in the wet and dry. During the race, many people got caught out by track limits whereas we did our best to capitalize on this, gained positions and kept consistent to finish in a respectable GT4 Overall top 10 position and just shyly missing out on a podium in Pro-Am.
The results plateaued a bit from there with the next 2 races being mostly uneventful for us with good enough results, consistently sitting in the mid-pack both at Snetterton and Donington, apart from an incident at Snetterton that prevented us from a potential second podium of the season.
However, the final race of the season proved to be just what we were waiting for. After turning up on Friday and doing the usual track walk, Saturday came around, and with no testing prior to the event, our first time in the car was Practice 1. We struggled with the car all throughout practice and into qualifying with clutch issues and car alignment being slightly out making the car very hard to drive. This all meant that any data from that day was inaccurate, so going into Sunday morning a setup change was a hail-mary that turned out to be exactly what we needed. Colin was able to drive a mega stint, most definitely his best of the season and absolutely shone, avoiding any of the typical lap one damage, managing traffic and gained multiple places, handing over the car in a brilliant P2 in class. My stint was plagued with Full Course Yellows and Safety Cars which stopped me from going racing properly to the flag. However, after avoiding a big crash which coincidentally took out some of the chasing Pro-Am cars, the safety car pulled into the pits leaving us with less than 15 minutes of racing and also positioning me directly behind the Pro-Am class leader. A bold move into turn one lead to me taking the class lead, and holding off the chasing cars with the help of the second Ginetta behind presented me, Colin and the team with our best result of the year, finally, a race win!
This season would not have been possible without the support of my sponsors Origin Secured, VVS and The New Homes Group who have helped me so much this year and I hope to continue working with in the future, along with many people behind the scenes, Paddock Management and my family with no thanks spared for my Dad and my Girlfriend Darby who made sure that I kept holding my head high even when the going got tough.
I also cannot put into words how proud I am of Colin for his constant and consistent improvement throughout the season and the CWS Racing team who Ryan has shaped into a strong, competitive environment and members of Colin’s Family who made sure everyone’s needs were taken care of and taking up crucial roles when called upon. It has been such a pleasant experience to have driven this year next to a motorsport legend such as Colin himself, I am absolutely honoured to have spent this time learning and sharing the car with such a respected member of this sport and I hope we cross paths again in the future.
I would also like to thank Ginetta for providing me with a car for this year that, while having its difficulties, has proven to be a brilliant race car and a platform that both myself, Colin and the team were able to optimise and turn it into a race winning car.
Finally, anyone who has been following me throughout the past year knows that I have been dipping my toes into some other things this year such as GT Cup in an Artura GT4 to see what options I have available for the future. Keeping my options open for 2025 and looking into what I can do and where is now my main goal while it is the off season. I look forward to being able to announce the next step in my career and hope that 2025 is going to include just as many good memories as this year!