The 2016 motorsport season promises to be the busiest and best yet for Rochester based Team Hard racing and team principal Tony Gilham.

Not only will they be continuing with their campaings in the Volkswagen Racing Cup and the VAG Trophy, and their British Touring Car Championship, with two cars this season. They will also be expanding into the British GT series running two Ginetta’s.

Speaking about the season ahead and his feet not being able to touch the ground, with Kent Sports News, Tony said: “To be honest no, it has just rolled off the back of 2015 and it has been a nonstop very busy winter.

“We are expanding in all areas, and are very much ahead of schedule in terms of in the plan that we had when we reinvented ourselves just over a year ago. We had a ten year plan and we are pretty much nine years ahead of schedule at the moment which is good.

“We are very busy and like I say we are now competing at every level of the motorsport ladder and the news is still coming in.”

With the two cars in the BTCC, and the British GT expansion things are now coming to fruition for Tony and the team.

He added: “It is finally, it is the culmination of a lot of hard work, years and years of a lot of hard work from everybody, it is a team effort. We have managed to retain some really good people around us, nobody can do it on their own, it is fantastic staffing behind the scenes that made all this possible.

“Unbelievable sponsors and very loyal sponsors in RCIB, and there are a few other people that have remained with us no matter what. They have helped us get back on track and start to build something special, there are a lot more things coming that are going to be even better than what we have got already. It will become more and more apparent that we are very unique in the way that we operate and the amount that we are actually helping out drivers, over and above what teams are generally able to offer.”

This winter season saw the return of the Team Hard scholarship which was incredibly competitive and lead to some tough decisions for Tony to make.

“It has been unbelievable, we ran it once before and it wasn’t a great success, and we don’t need to go into detail about that one. Let’s talk about this scholarship, it has been amazing and the feedback has been great.

“We had over 120 entrants in the end and we have our final to run in the next week or so, and the talent is unbelievable. There is people who have never sat in a car before and never driven on a track before and they made the final. There are people that have only ever raced a go kart and there are people that might have done a little bit more club racing, but we do limit the amount of experience that they can have to enter because it is a very big prize of a six figure prize for the winner, full management programme and a full funded drive for the year which is backed by our sponsors.

“It is a very good opportunity for somebody and we have been able to form a relationship a friendship with and helping them into racing as well. Being a family team it is about helping people, and we have already managed to get a few bums in seats so to speak. At a very affordable level as we are able to accommodate their needs and make them appeal a lot more too potential sponsors or partners.”

Being a Kent based team Tony is always on the lookout for local Kent based drivers that he can put in one of the teams cars.

Tony said: “We are for sure, born and bred in Kent a Kent team with lots of Kent drivers and we have a few Kent sponsors. Yourself (Kent Sports News) who we’ve always had an involvement with over the last few years, we are proud to be from Kent.

“We are maybe the biggest team in Kent now, there is a few other teams about and we won’t mention no names. We are doing the best job that we can and if we can support local talent that is what is all about.”

We are now into March and the season really starts to get going with testing and Tony is clearly like a kid at Christmas and getting ready to get underway for 2016.

 

He added: “I have been excited since the season finished last year, the last day of October the 2016 season has begun for us. I have been excited for a long long time, realistically only I know what is going on inside my head, which is sometimes a good place to be and sometimes who knows what is going on.

“There is plenty of exciting news to come, even though we have had so much already, it is a very proud time for us all here at Team Hard. Like I say being a Kent based team, when we do get the Kent based drivers on-board, that is really good. I would say that we are approaching double figures to Kent drivers now.”

With the season being so busy, we asked Tony how he plans to divide his time on all the race series that the teams will be competing in.

He said: “We have chosen fairly wisely with our main series that we are supporting, obviously the British Touring Cars there is only one clash with the British GT. The British GT is on the same weekends as the Volkswagen Racing cup, with the VAG Trophy there is only one clash with the VW.

“Realistically it’s busy in terms of the number of weekends but our time should be split evenly across all, we have drivers across every level that are more than capable of battling at the sharp end and picking up silverware. I am expecting to be putting a few more shelves up at HQ this year for the trophies. We are behind all of our drivers and we want all of them to win. Finishing last year with a top five lockout in the Volkswagen cup, I nearly fell off the pit wall with excitement, and that is how much it means to us all.

“I think it sets us aside and we have a really good bond here behind the scenes, and with all of our drivers there is very much a personal touch. We just love working with people and we love growing and we love to help out people as much as we can.

“The decision was I either race myself or use my sponsorship for me, which would be very selfish thing to do, or spread my sponsorship across the whole of the team and that enables us to support a number of drivers. That’s what we are doing and yes I would love to race myself but at the same time I get a huge satisfaction with supporting up and coming talent at every level, and that for me is satisfying my wants and needs in motorsport.”

Finally, we asked Tony whether he would be back behind the wheel or whether he would be focussing on building Team Hard.

“It is all about other people at the moment, I would love to drive and I am still a frustrated racing driver, but we are also a team owner and trying to build something very special. For me I have a lot of people that we are responsible for and I have a commitment to people and we made promises to that we need to keep.

“For now I have no immediate plans to return the demand is getting higher from certain sponsors and partners for me to be in the car, but I have to make sure the timing is right and doesn’t dilute what we are trying to build. The last thing that I want to do is be a negative or a drain on our company and go against what we are trying to do, it is very difficult to balance but who knows I may do the odd round.

“I would love to get back in the touring car, I ended up doing a couple of rounds last year, which was totally unplanned, and I have thought about doing this season. Its either we back ourselves or we back other up and coming people that probably wouldn’t have had the opportunity without our backing on its own.

“The drivers that we have got this season are quick and we are raising a lot of their funding with them and for them, we are giving people opportunity. I believe that is why we are growing and we are able to help our drivers a lot more than most other people do because of the way our structure is set.”

Pictures courtesy of www.psp-images.co.uk