+ 21 GT3s amongst 33-strong entry
+ 2 Seas and Optimum top the early standings
+ Provisional entry list: Silverstone 500
British GT events don’t get any bigger than the Silverstone 500, which plays host to Round 2 of the 2025 campaign this weekend. 33 cars – 21 of them GT3s – are set to contest the championship’s blue riband three-hour race in which strategy is no less important than speed.
2 Seas’ Charles Dawson and Kiern Jewiss top the GT3 standings following the opening round at Donington where Jack Brown also made the perfect start to his and Optimum’s GT4 title defence alongside new co-driver Marc Warren. But there’s now a price to pay for those victories on Sunday when both crews must serve the extra 20 seconds of compensation time at the last of their three mandatory driver changes.
Such handicaps can, and have, been overturned before, albeit only once at the 500. What’s more, only one driver – Sandy Mitchell – has claimed the historic 1932 RAC Trophy on multiple occasions, while as many different manufacturers have triumphed there in the last four years. In short: this is a very tough race to win.
Naturally, the Silverstone 500 counts towards GT3 and GT4’s overall and class championships. But it’s also Round 2 of the new Endurance Cup, which began at Donington Park earlier this month.
Sky Sports F1 and SRO’s GT World YouTube channel will have live qualifying and race coverage this Saturday and Sunday. The latter’s build-up will, weather permitting, feature the Red Devils Parachute Display Team which is due to perform over and then land on the grid before the start.
GT3: Can Collard topple 2 Seas?
The senior class includes several significant talking points at Silverstone. But for starters it’s hard to look beyond reigning champion and 2020 500 winner Rob Collard who returns to action with Barwell following an unforeseen medical procedure. Compensation time of varying degrees for the other leading contenders makes the #1 Huracan he shares with Hugo Cook a serious victory threat.
Barwell’s other Lamborghini finished second at Donington and will therefore have +15s to deal with during its final pitstop on Sunday. What’s more, this is the first of three weekends that Alex Martin isn’t paired with his regular co-driver, Sandy Mitchell. Race winner and former title contender Patrick Kujala replaces the Scot.
2 Seas also knows how to win with Mercedes-AMG at Silverstone having done so as a guest entrant in 2021. But its chances of another success are limited by two significant factors: compensation time and ballast.
Dawson and Jewiss’ qualifying and race performances en route to victory at Donington were beyond those expected of a pairing comprising FIA Bronze and Silver graded drivers. To balance that potential, their entry will carry an additional 30kg of ballast whilst also serving the standard maximum compensation time of 20 seconds during the car’s final mandatory pitstop.
Their team-mates, Kevin Tse and Maximilian Götz, also have a time handicap (10 seconds) for finishing third on the opening weekend.
Garage 59’s victory 12 months ago saw the 720S join its GT3 predecessors – the 650S and 12C – on the 500’s roll of honour. The team and drivers responsible, Shaun Balfe and Adam Smalley, will not defend their win this year, but there are still no shortage of McLarens waiting in the wings. Optimum’s Morgan Tillbrook and Marvin Kirchhöfer are chief among them: they finished fourth at Donington, while the German came within 0.5s of Silverstone victory in 2022.
As the saying almost goes, you wait an age for one Ferrari to compete in British GT and then three turn up at once! Sky Tempesta’s aborted Silverstone entry aside (the car was withdrawn after Free Practice last season), Maranello hasn’t contested a race in the top class since Snetterton 2020. But that run should, finally, come to an end this weekend thanks to Spirit of Race and Kessel Racing.
Clashing European Le Mans Series commitments prevented Duncan Cameron and Matt Griffin from appearing at Donington, but they will lead a Spirit of Race assault that also features debutants Marcos Vivian and Francesco Castellacci. Fellow guests Andrew Gilbert and Fran Rueda, meanwhile, make their third-straight 500 appearance, albeit in a 296 GT3 instead of the 720S.
Like Spirit of Race, Blackthorn has also added a second car to its stable. 2012 winner Charles Bateman and team owner Claude Bovet are both former 500 entrants, but in reality it’s the sister full-season Aston Martin shared by Giacomo Petrobelli and Jonny Adam that looks most likely to mount a podium challenge. Somewhat incredibly, Adam has taken only one of his 19 overall wins at Silverstone, and that was all the way back in 2011 with AMR’s first GT3, the DBRS9.
BMW’s previous generation M4 won the 500 two years ago and was a victory contender again last season. Now 2023’s victorious duo and champions, Darren Leung and Dan Harper, return with the updated Evo version in search of a second win. Their Paradine-run example is one of two BMWs on the entry this weekend: Century’s Jon Kearney and Will Moore will be eyeing Silver-Am spoils.
Elsewhere, Steller – which hasn’t contested British GT’s senior class since 2020 – fields an R8 for Darren Burke and two-time GT4 class 500 winner Matt Topham who subbed for Collard at the season opener.
GT4: Brown and Optimum up for 500 hat-trick
Jack Brown loves the Silverstone 500. He and Optimum’s Artura have been unbeatable there over the last two years despite Silver crews’ extra pitstop time being multiplied over three driver changes. Indeed, those circumstances had previously favoured Pro-Am line-ups, which won five of the 500’s previous six editions.
The problem for everyone else this weekend is that Brown, for the first time, is now one half of a Pro-Am partnership. True, he and Marc Warren will serve +20s at their final pitstop for winning at Donington, but they will not be subject to the weight and time handicap incurred by Silvers over the three-hour duration.
That also plays into the hands of other leading Pro-Am contenders, chief among which are Ravi Ramyead and Charlie Robertson who finished second on the opening weekend. Century’s BMW therefore cops a 15-second handicap at its third stop but should have the speed to overcome the disadvantage.
Likewise Ed McDermott and Seb Morris whose Team Parker Mercedes-AMG completed GT4’s overall podium and bagged full Endurance Cup points last time out. Morris, like his team-mate Phil Keen in the sister entry, is also an overall 500 winner. Only Adam Balon has won it as a GT3 and GT4 driver.
Mahiki’s Lotuses were fast but ultimately fell short at Donington where its Silver crew of Aiden Neate and Josh Miller qualified on pole before starting from the rear. Neate had worked his way back to the front before the opening stint was done, but that wasn’t enough to overcome the extra pitstop time that then dropped it behind the top Pro-Ams.
The other two Emiras suffered various woes but did show enough potential to suggest they’ll be part of the conversation on Sunday. Ian Duggan took his Lotus to an overall GT4 podium last year, while Steven Lake’s co-driver Jack Mitchell is a previous class winner.
Optimum’s other McLaren, shared by Luca Hopkinson and Harry George, started second on the opening weekend but barely made it around the first lap before gearbox issues forced it to pit. The young duo will be eager to make amends at Silverstone where the Artura has proven so potent in team-mate Brown’s hands.
Three Endurance Cup entries complete the list of GT4 contenders.
Will Burns and Jamie Orton continue with the Porsche Cayman that Rob Boston Racing switched to at Donington, Peter Montague and Stuart Hall (MKH) share the sole Aston Martin, and there’s another McLaren courtesy of Jolt’s Rupert Williams and John Ingram.
SILVERSTONE 500 TIMETABLE
FRIDAY 25 APRIL
13:50 – 14:50: Test 1
16:30 – 17:30: Test 2
SATURDAY 26 APRIL
09:30 – 10:30: Free Practice
12:20 – 13:20: Pre-Qualifying
16:15 – 16:25: Qualifying 1 (GT3)
16:29 – 16:39: Qualifying 2 (GT3)
16:43 – 16:53: Qualifying 3 (GT4)
16:58 – 17:08: Qualifying 4 (GT4)
SUNDAY 27 APRIL
09:30 – 09:45: Warm-up
12:30 – 15:30: Race
LAP RECORDS
GT3 – 1m58.304s – Marvin Kirchhöfer – Garage 59 McLaren 720S GT3 – 2022
GT4 – 2m09.861s – Sennan Fielding – Steller Motorsport Audi R8 LMS GT4 – 2022
PITSTOP SPECIFICS – THREE-HOUR RACES
Three driver changes must occur during the three hours. There are no pitstop windows but each driver cannot exceed 65 minutes of continuous drive time and 100 minutes cumulative drive time. Any compensation time accrued at the previous event must be served during the final mandatory pitstop.
Mandatory Pitstop Times (pit-in to pit-out)
GT3: 115s | GT4: 145s
Pitstop Compensation Time
20s – #42 2 Seas Mercedes-AMG (GT3) + #90 Optimum Motorsport McLaren (GT4)
15s – #78 Barwell Motorsport Lamborghini (GT3) + #71 Century Motorsport BMW
10s – #18 2 Seas Motorsport Mercedes-AMG (GT3) + #12 Team Parker Racing Mercedes-AMG (GT4)
All GT4 Silver Cup entries must serve an additional 12s during their mandatory driver changes and carry 25kg of ballast.
