GT3 The State Of Play: Part 3, Performance Progression

GT3 is about to be confirmed as the pinnacle of GT competition across the world with the end, after the 2023 season, of the GTE formula, to be replaced in ACO competition in the FIA WEC and ELMS by the as-yet not defined, GT3 Premium.

The GT3 ‘formula’ was established in 2006 with the FIA GT3 European Championship the first Series established for the then new cars.

The series welcomed full grids of brand new cars and, thereafter interest, racing opportunities, costs and in no small regard, pace, increased rapidly.

The ‘reference’ GT3 car around which the Balance of Performance was defined in 2006 was the Porsche contender, effectively a then contemporary 911 GT3 Cup.

The Porsche was joined on the grids by the Dodge Viper, Ascari KZ1, Maserati GranSport Light and Callaway Corvette Z06.R, all four marques that have since left the scene (for now at least) plus the initial GT3 offerings of three more survivors: Lamborghini (with the Reiter engineering built Gallardo), Ferrari, (F430) and Aston Martin (DBRS9).

The following year GT4 arrived on the scene, billed as mildly upgraded sportscars and featuring, in the first season, the Nissan 350Z, Aston Martin V8 Vantage N24, Ford Mustang FR500C, BMW Z4, Lotus Exige GT4, Maserati Trofeo and, late in the season, the Ginetta G50.  Plenty of variety, but GT4 took a year or several to truly bed in.

Since then things have moved on somewhat – The 2006 Porsche 911 GT3 Cup was powered by a 3.6 litre flat 6 pushing out around 394 bhp without any Balance of Performance adjustments.

By comparison the new for 2023 version of the Porsche 911 GT3 R is powered by a new 4.2 litre 6 producing an un-bopped 565 bhp, over 40% more powerful than it’s 2006 predecessor!

In the decade and a half that has passed, technology, aerodynamics, electronics and, in particular tyre tech, have all progressed very significantly.

Circuits have evolved too, some of them profoundly, as has the tech involved in surfacing.

So just what has that brought us in terms of pace progression –

There’s really only one circuit where a true, dry weather, comparison from the first year of the formulas can be drawn.

Spa Francorchamps saw its major revamp, with the end of the old ‘Bus Stop’ before GT3 took to the stage and the cars have raced there ever since.

To make a true comparison too, we’ll look simply at SRO’s top competitions for the formulae in each of the years.  Why? because other Series have different tyres and different BoP. The GT3 lap record for instance is not held by a car contesting the GT World Challenge at Spa, but by a car racing in the International GT Open, and the lap-time differences ‘in extremis’ are significant – multiple seconds!

Also for the purposes of this comparison we’ll look at the peak qualifying performances, in dry conditions, not always the best indication of raceability, but the best we have for a true reflection of raw available performance with the prevailing circuit, cars, tyres and BoP.

The pole time for the very first FIA GT3 European Series race at Spa – in 2006 – went to the #10 Racing Logistic Dodge Viper Competition CC of Patrick Bornhauser and Fred Bouvy with a time of 2:27.050.

By 2022 the FIA GT3 European Series was long gone, replaced by the GT World Challenge Europe’s premier race, the Spa 24 Hours, since 2011 a more or less entirely GT3-populated race. The SuperPole time of pole setter Rafaelle Marciello was 2:16.375, 10.675 seconds faster than the 2006 pole time around the 7 km circuit.

In 2007, the first season of the GT4 European Cup, Maxime Soulet in his #20 Porsche Cayman scored pole with a 2:38.593.

By 2022 the Championship had morphed into the GT4 European Series and the quicker of the qualifying session in the Spa 24 Hours-supporting double header saw a fastest qualifying time in the session for the first of two races, the time going to Antoine Leclerc in the #36 Code Racing Alpine A110 GT4 – 2:29.052, 9.541 seconds faster than the 2007 pole.

Perhaps just as significantly as the time gaps between the historic comparisons within the two classes (GT3 and GT4) is the difference between a 2006 GT3 and a 2022 GT4 – just 2.002 seconds apart, a time that would have been good enough for 11th on the 39 car GT3 grid in 2006.

For completeness we’ll pop in some additional yardsticks – 2006 saw both GT1 and GT2 still very much part of the picture and, as we’ll see, they both have a role in displaying how far things have progressed.

2006
GT1 2:14.871 (Spa 24 Aston Martin DBR9)

GT2 2:22.095 (Spa 24 Ferrari 430 GTC)

GT3 2:27.050 (FIA GT3 European Series)

GT4 (2007) 2:38.593 (GT4 European Cup)

2022
GTE Pro: 2:14.301 (FIA WEC Porsche 911 RSR)

GT2 (SRO) 2:20.417 (GT2 European Series – Anders Fjordbach Brabham BT63 GT2 Concept)

GT3 2:16.375 (Spa 24 Hours)

GT4 2:29.052 (GT4 European Series)

The GT1 pole time for the 2006 Spa 24 Hours was slower than the GTE Pro pole in the WEC in 2022, and only a second and a half quicker than this years GT3 pole setter

GTE’s predecessor GT2 class pole setter in 2006 was 6 seconds slower than this years GT3 pole, indeed the current (SRO) GT2 class pole, set by Anders Fjordbach in the High Class Racing Brabham was very close indeed to that historical GT2 mark (and almost seven seconds faster than the 2006 GT3 pole time).

One final mark to note. Whilst the progression in pace for GT3 is very notable indeed, allowing comparison of pace only across the SRO platforms provides only part of the story.

Both BoP and indeed the tyres, spec or otherwise, used by a variety of Championships can have a very profound effect on performance.

How profound? Well, take the 2022 Spa 24 Hours Superpole time of Rafaelle Marciello with a hugely impressive 2:16.375 and compare it to the pole-setting effort of Vincent Abril in the APM Monaco Ferrari 488 GT3 in qualifying for International GT Open in 2020, on their Michelin tyres and with a very different BoP.

Abril’s time was a mighty 2:13.724! Over 2.5 seconds faster than the Spa 24 pole lap (in a car of the same class), over 13 seconds faster than the fastest GT3 lap in 2006 and a second faster than an Aston Martin DBR9 managed that same year.

That, is some progress!

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