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This past weekend the Sasol GTC Championship held its first round of the 2017 season where several serious engine reliability issues were encountered.
GTC is a category that has been promoted as being “serious, affordable racing” and it was clear from the beginning that the 2.0-litre turbo engines, which were required to secure manufacturer involvement, would need improvement in terms of both performance and their sound if GTC was to be successful in attracting fans back to the race tracks and to build a commercially successful business.
A lot of work went on behind the scenes to make advances in performance so that the start of 2017 would see a marked improvement. These changes needed to be balanced against keeping the category affordable.
The first round in Cape Town has clearly demonstrated that the changes are inadequate.
The situation is unacceptable for all concerned and in particular for the race fans, who deserve far better from GTC.
GTC’s senior management team takes the responsibility of running the category in a professional, entertaining and sustainable way very seriously, and is already working intensively to find solutions.
GTC will continue to do so over the coming weeks with the teams, manufacturers, Motorsport South Africa and commercial partners to bring about meaningful and lasting solutions to improve the sound, reliability and performance of the GTC cars.
Once an agreement has been reached on the solutions, a further statement will be made within the next two weeks.
