After a hugely successful opening weekend in Milan, Italy the Blancpain GT Sprint Cup travelled across Europe to Kent for it’s second round at Brands Hatch.

The world-famous championship was greeted with the arrival of the English summer which, along with the on-track entertainment drew in a great crowd.

The two day event saw some of the worlds best sports-cars and drivers go door-to-door around the picturesque ex-Grand Prix circuit, through numerous hours of track time. With thirty-seven GT3 spec race cars entered, action was always a guarantee. Qualifying concluded with the top-eighteen covered by under one second with the ISR Audi R8 of Marlon Stockinger, Franck Perera setting the bench mark time. The first of the British marques came in sixth in the form of the Garage 59 Mclaren 650s.

With the grid set, the qualifying race took place early Sunday morning which gave the field it’s chance to race it’s way in to position for the main feature race later that day. The pole sitting ISR Audi would lose the lead from the very start as the HTP Mercedes AMG piloted by Jules Szymkowiak, would drive clean around the outside going in to Paddock Hill bend.

This would prove to be the defining moment of the race as Szymkowiak would drive away in to the distance with the help of team mate Bernd Schneider. A clean race would follow as the field would bring it home with ambitions to improve when it counts later on.

The main race saw these previously flaunted clean driving standards some what deteriorate. Drivers bumped and barged their way around through the Kentish hills and a number of cars fell foul to punctures and crashes which staged a ten minute shoot out following a late safety car for a crash at Westfield Bend. At this point, the WRT Audi of Enzo Ide and Christopher Mies had jumped to the front through the pit stop cycle with the HTP Mercedes of Szymkowiak on their tail. Mies would keep his focus and hold off the arguably faster Merc’ and bring home the main race victory but behind the charging Bentley of Andy Soucek and Maxime Soulet would round off the podium after having started the days morning qualifying race twenty fourth!

Alongside the Blancpain GT Sprint Cup, SRO brought across the Blancpain GT Sports club (for the gentleman sportscar drivers in a number of machines ranging through the years gone by) and the Ultra sports car club (for the super rich to show off the current hyper cars on the market) to be on the support package, all of which thrilled the sun-drenched crowd.

The GT sports club saw a few ex-Le Mans GT Ferrari’s and Corvettes take to the track and provide the soundtrack of the weekend while dicing with a mix of current and previous generation GT3 machines, but it was the Ultra sports car club which really wowed the crowds. As an Aston Martin Vulcan and a pair of multi-million pound, Mclaren P1 GTR’s took to the track (and at speed) they really gave people an idea of what the current super cars are all about. It’s a rare occasion when a brand new Pagani Huayra is seemly un-interesting as it gets lapped by the more extravagant British machines!

Besides the SRO run entertainment, both the GT cup and the Mini Challenge were on the support bill which gave the national club level competitors a chance to shine on the world stage. Jordan Witt put on a master class in his Bentley Continental GT3 as he scored race victory in all three of the GT Cup’s weekends races, all from pole position – lapping at speeds easily comparable to the big boys in the Blancpain Sprint Cup!

As for local interest, young superstar Esmee Hawkey starred amongst the GT4 (GTA) machines in her (brand new for 2016) Porsche Cayman scoring her first GTA podium in just her second GT Cup meeting, when paired with James Birch for the longer of the three races run on the Sunday.

The off track entertainment lived up to the on tracks with a number of supercars scattered around the public areas for people to check out, along with the usual MSV fair ground activities to keep the whole family smiling.

Overall, another fantastic weekend put on by the SRO and Brands Hatch, building on from the successful début last year for the event. With almost double the Blancpain GT Sprint Cup entries than last year, you can only begin to imagine what next years edition could be like and with this quickly becoming one of Brands Hatch’s and Kent’s premier motorsporting weekends, I’m sure it will be around for a many more years to come!