GT & Sports Car Cup Race Report: Coppa Città Di Enna, Sicily 2024

CONGRATULATIONS TO OUR RACE WINNERS
Robin Ellis & Julian Thomas - Lotus Elan 26R 'Shapecraft'
Settimana Motoristica Ennese
Autodromo Pergusa 18/19 May 2024

Ellis and Thomas’ Elan victorious in Sicilian sunshine

Consistent pace, reliability and driving stamina in the Sicilian heat were always going to be deciding factors in our eagerly-awaited GTSCC season-opener at the Autodromo di Pergusa, where speed-carrying agility through the chicanes on the lap of the lake are more a key to success than power alone. Thus it proved on May 18-19 as the 1600cc Lotus Elan 26R Shapecraft coupe of Robin Ellis and Julian Thomas - the car driven by Major Richard Crosfield to fourth place in the GT support race for the 1964 Goodwood TT enduro, and raced continually since - emerged victorious on the aggregate result of twin 75-minute races on Saturday and Sunday. “Having won October’s [multi-discipline] Cento Ore di Modena in it, to win again was pretty special,” said owner Ellis, praising preparer Nick Woodham of Wolfe Manufacturing.

In a resounding one-two finish for Elans, 2009 UK Historic Formula Junior champion Chris Drake and Californian Danny Baker - making series debuts - earned the runner-up spot, their conventional 26R-spec car two laps behind its genetically modified stablemate. After two and a half hours of gruelling racing, just 1.444s blanketed them, Sports Car victor John Spiers (Lister-Jaguar Costin) and GT3 winners Nils-Fredrik Nyblaeus/Jeremy Welch (Austin-Healey 3000) on combined race times!

Our coveted invitation to be one of three feature grids at the special Settimana Motoristica Ennese showcase from May 17-19 - promoted by the venue and nearby historic city as a multi-faceted cultural event, but effectively a private race meeting for us, Formula Junior and the HGPCA - saw us compete under the hallowed Coppa Città di Enna race title which proudly graced World Sportscar Championship rounds on the Mediterranean island’s permanent racetrack in the 1950s and ’60s.

Built in 1951, the high-speed autodromo, tamed to a degree by variantes (chicanes) added in 1970, ’71 and ’76 - an era when it hosted the European Formula 2 Championship - may still be delightfully historic in character, but has been robustly resurfaced by Pirelli for year-round tyre testing in recent years. Clerk of the Course/Race Director Graziano Basile was a wonderful ringmaster, genial, charming and competitor-focused - qualities which quickly allayed natural concerns in visiting a venue for the first time. President of the Autodromo Pergusa, Mario Sgrò, the mastermind behind the event, gave a wonderful welcome to the race promotors, drivers and teams and set the stage for a highly memorable trip to Sicily. But our unsung hero was Andrea Stortoni who, having been instrumental in making the logistics work throughout the process, was unfortunately sidelined from competing when his Lotus 11’s transmission broke.       

“The event was quirky, but absolutely fabulous in so many ways,” said GTSCC co-founder Vanessa Marçais. “From Thursday’s welcome dinner to the end of the three-day event the organisers bent over backwards to ensure that everybody had an enjoyable experience. They looked after us really well, providing excellent catering at the circuit and, after the initial briefing, presented the drivers with welcome baskets of ‘gadgets’ (!) including olive bread, olive oil, bottles of Limoncello emblazoned with the Coppa Città di Enna logo and event posters. Nobody will forget their kindness“, said Flavien.

Twenty three teams, the majority UK-based, made the pilgrimage to the centre of Sicily, their cars either transported through France, then down the length of Italy by road or ferry. For some, the Automobile Club de Monaco’s Grand Prix Historique was a swanky halfway halt the previous weekend, but perhaps inevitably took its mechanical toll.

Following Max Smith-Hilliard’s unexpected but well-deserved sportscar plateau victory in the Principality, piloting the ex-Cliff Davis Lotus-Bristol X – félicitations, Max - the car was regretfully returned to England for suspension checks rather than being sent almost 1000 miles further south. Nonetheless, numbering six the Sports Car turnout was the strongest for many years as the GTSCC crusaders visited Italian soil for the first time since Monza in 2013.

Friday’s free practice enabled competitors to discover the 4.95 kilometre (3.075 mile) Cattedrale della Velocita, tackled clockwise. Only the Chris Chiles padre e figlio AC Cobra 289 broke two minutes, in half a dozen sighting laps. Another father and son team, Justin and Ben Maeers (Cooper-Climax T49 Monaco), was second, chased by Ellis/Thomas and Nyblaeus/Welch in the Swede’s big Healey.

For the eventual victors the session could have been the end of the adventure for a bird strike cracked the Lotus’ laminated windscreen. “The poor thing flew out from under the armco and bang,” said Ellis, who was at the wheel. With no spare locally - Elans are not a common commodity on the volcanic island - the team carefully patched it up. “We managed to borrow some clear helicopter tape, and where the screen almost popped out of its rubbers at the bottom in the middle and on the driver’s lower corner, made it as strong as we could. The scrutineers eventually agreed to let us run, but the [translucent] tape made the corner a bit foggy, making it more difficult to place.”      

Chris Drake/Danny Baker (Elan 26R), Keith Ahlers/Billy Bellinger (Morgan +4 SLR), Nick Finburgh/Ollie Crosthwaite (Lola Mk1) and Canadian Brad Baker (Maserati 300S) were all inside 2m10s in the preliminaries, Brad having finished second to Irishman Paddins Dowling (ERA R5B ‘Remus’) in Monaco’s early single-seater set at the wheel of the ex-Peter Whitehead 1938 Australian GP-winning ERA R10B and raced the glorious maroon Maserati there too.   

John Spiers brought his newly-acquired Lister-Jaguar Costin - as opposed to his previous Knobby - and headed a group comprising Dutchmen Christiaen van Lanschot/Karsten Le Blanc in the famous David Dixon/Ecurie Chiltern Le Mans Healey ‘DD 300,’

Simon King/Richard Plant (Morgan +4 Super Sports), Richard Wilson’s ex-Jim Hall/Carroll Shelby Maserati 250S and Rob Newall/Oliver Marçais in Sir David Scholey’s Jaguar XK120.

Porsche specialists Peter Tognola and Steve Monk (911) and versatile Welshman Karl Jones in John Clark’s Cooper T39 Bobtail got a few laps in, although Guy Harman (MGB) stopped at three. “I couldn’t help thinking about the F2 boys hurtling round there before the chicanes were put in. That must have been terrifying,” said former Brands Hatch Formula Ford champion Jones.

Touring Car runners Ellie Birchenhough/Nick Topliss (Austin Mini Cooper S) and Richard and Alice Locke (Mini Broadspeed GTS) weren’t far apart, separated by Marc Gordon’s grey Jaguar XK140 coupe. Jeremy Woods/Alastair Pugh’s rare Triumph Italia 2000 ran briefly, stopping out on track, but German Rebeca Rettenmaier’s Alfa Romeo GTA didn’t.

Italian Stortoni’s Lotus 11, for which Oliver Marçais was nominated as second driver, was a disappointing casualty when its gearbox failed during an extra Friday test session. Doctor Allan and Daniel Ross-Jones’ Triumph TR4 - similar to Angelo Rizzo’s which finished eighth in the 1964 Coppa Città di Enna - turned out for qualifying, an airline having handily cancelled their original flight. Having withdrawn his Maserati 250S when calculations suggested it did not quite have the tankage to run for 75 minutes without refuelling, Richard Wilson teamed-up with Brad Baker in the larger Maser.

Twenty one cars thus went out for Saturday morning’s qualifying session. Chiles/Chiles Jr improved to 1:57.530 (an impressive 94.18mph average) to bag pole position in the Cobra. Thomas’ cracking 1:59.973 in Ellis’ alloy-roofed Elan fastback - a conversion designed, raced and in 1964 marketed by period Lotus dealer Barry Wood of Surbiton Motors, whose son Neil is a longtime Historic winner in his pristine Ford Anglia 105E - ensured a GT front row lockout.

The quickest sports racers formed the second rank, Maeers/Maeers Jr’s 2:01.664 edging Spiers’ 2:02.384 in the blue Lister. Drake/Baker’s 2:05.915 in the dove grey Elan 26R was 0.344s up on the Baker/Wilson Maserati for fifth - still on Dunlop R5 tyres from its Monaco run - with GT3 class leaders Ahlers/Bellinger on their tail with an excellent 2:06.523 (87.49mph) in the ex-works [Sprinzel Lawrencetune Racing] Morgan aerodyne coupe, powered by 2.1-litre Triumph engine running a period-originated crossflow head and capable of 145mph, 20mph more than open Super Sports versions.

Class rivals Nyblaeus/Welch were eighth quickest in the red Healey on 2:07.447, split from the British Racing Green one of van Lanschot/Le Blanc by 1.347s and the class-leading Lola-Climax of Finburgh/Crosthwaite on 2:07.565 (86.77mph). Clark/Jones’ centre-seat Cooper and the Ross-Jones Triumph rounded out the top 12, on 2:12.959 and 2:14.690 (82.18mph) respectively.

Harman/Crosthwaite (MGB) and Newall/Marçais in the open XK120 - hindered by a slipping clutch, which Classic Autos’ spannermen had insufficient time to change for the afternoon’s race, but with a great team effort would get it out for Sunday’s  - had made it an all ivory seventh rank, both in the lower 2:18s, ahead of the BMC A-Series battlers, Birchenhough/Topliss’ Dorset Racing Mini on 1:21.678 (75.41mph) shading the Locke father and daughter combo by 0.895s for Touring Car pole, the latter’s a fine effort with an electrical misfire.

King/Plant’s open Morgan was just 0.038s adrift of the Lockes’ maroon Broadspeed coupe, with Gordon, Tognola/Monk, Woods/Pugh and Rettenmaier/Ian Nuthall completing the pack, although a stubborn misfire limited the GTA’s lappery to just two, to the chagrin of local Alfisti willing on the three Italian cars present.

With ambient temperatures climbing into the low 30s Celsius - imagine mid-40sC, the norm for European Formula 3000 Championship rounds, staged in mid-July back in the 1980s! - for Saturday afternoon’s opening race, taking on water to ward off dehydration was crucial to combatants, particularly those saddling closed cars with the first leg’s start at 15.35. Twenty teams, all bar the clutchless XK120, formed the grid. Late away on the parade lap was the Broadspeed GTS, which refused to fire up on the grid due to a starter motor issue. It was push-started and caught the crocodile behind the safety car. 

As the field came under orders and was released, Spiers muscled through from P4 to chase Chiles Sr’s gruff Cobra as they swept left into the first chicane, the Variante Vitalo. Maeers’ two-litre Climax FPF-powered Cooper, the Elans of Ellis and Drake, Brad Baker’s Maserati, Ahlers’ Morgan and the big Healeys of van Lanschot and Nyblaeus led the pursuit at the end of the first lap.

Chiles powered past the Lister on lap six, and Spiers pitted next time round with aerated rear brakes. John continued with the rear hatch off, but lost valuable time. Early stoppers were Crosthwaite’s Lola, to have its flapping bonnet taped down, and Clark’s Cooper which had a long stop while mechanics repaired a fractured brake pipe, after which Jones jumped in. The Locke family’s Broadspeed lasted six laps meanwhile, one fewer than Rettenmaier’s still troubled Alfa.

The leading Cobra dived into the pits on lap 11, Chiles thinking he’d seen a black flag, but the team waved him back out as Ellis took over in front. Chris pitted after 16 laps to relay his son and brief leader Drake put Baker in a lap later. The blue Shapecraft Elan went back to the top of the chart, there to stay bar a lap when the Cobra hounded him down, only for Junior to stop on lap 32 with its oil pressure light aglow, signalling the engine’s demise and the end of the weekend.

The way was now clear for Thomas - who had been handed the Elan in the position he’d qualified it after a meritorious stint by Ellis - driving exquisitely, to complete the final four circuits to the chequered flag. A lap clear of the Drake/Baker version, Julian could afford to throttle back but the second Lotus finished with only 10.350s in hand over GT3 winners van Lanschot/Le Blanc in ‘DD300,’ which had Welch closing fast in Nyblaeus’ sister car. Jeremy was just 5.710s behind at the finish, keeping them in the hunt for Sunday.

Another lap adrift, the valiant little Lola of Finburgh/Crosthwaite claimed fifth overall and Sports Car gold, less than eight seconds ahead of Spiers’ hulking Lister. Despite pitting, Chiles/Chiles Jr were still classified seventh, on 32 laps, the distance eventually covered by the Tognola/Monk Porsche which claimed GT2 honours, just 1.809s ahead of Harman and Crosthwaite’s MGB in the dash to the flag! Third in class, the Morgan of King/Plant was on the same lap. Marc Gordon‘s Jag completed 31 laps to be 11th, a lap clear of Ellie and Nick’s Mini, the TC winner, and the Triumph Italia of Woods/Pugh which made it a 100 per cent finishing record in GT2. 

Jones got the Bobtail to the end, nursing a clutch issue, but less fortunate were the Ahlers/Bellinger Morgan which succumbed to a major engine failure when its camshaft “came out of the side of the engine” after 15 laps. The Maeers Cooper - after a long stop to investigate a clutch interlock issue - was also out two tours later. A broken valve spring saw the Ross-Jones TR4 parked after 20 laps, while clutch problems stopped Brad Baker’s Maserati, by then with Wilson at its helm.

Saturday’s attrition and the rigours of relentless heat reduced Sunday’s field to 17 cars. The XK120 was back in working order, but the big Maserati’s clutch mounting bolts were found to be sheared rendering it a non-starter. Jones was looking forward to starting the Cooper Bobtail, but as he brought it round to the grid third and fourth gears were absent, and gearbox input shaft failure was diagnosed. “How it finished yesterday I don’t know,” he said. Also in trouble was the Triumph Italia, which did not want to fire up on the grid but was pushed into the pitlane, then despatched.

Justin Maeers powered the Cooper Monaco ahead at the start, but Spiers went with him. Having just ceded the lead on lap 2, Maeers arrived at a chicane a tad hot and snaked in and out of the runoff area on the exit. It took very little time to regain momentum and he duly reeled in the Lister, which lost its spare wheel hatch as the race evolved. It was between the front and rear-engined Sports Racers throughout, but Maeers and son Ben prevailed in this leg.

Spiers was a strong second, but the Ellis/Thomas Elan - with a lap in hand over its nearest challengers, and two on Spiers - only had to cruise to the chequered flag for a memorable outright win. While they looked after the Lotus they kept it on the lead lap to complete a crushing victory: a remarkable story having sustained damage which could have sidelined them in free practice two days earlier.

“It’s an old school circuit which on paper did not look particularly interesting, but the reality is different.” said Julian. “It’s just fabulous and flowing. The surface is quite abrasive but grippy, and if you really load the Elan up, turning in [to the chicanes] early, you can touch the kerbs and carry speed without a problem. I loved it and now can’t wait to race there again. As often as possible!”

Fourth on the road, Drake/Baker were ecstatic with second on aggregate, ahead of Sunday pursuers and GT3 winners Nyblaeus/Welch, whose gallant Dutch rivals van Lanschot/Le Blanc ran ahead of them again until they were forced out by engine failure at two-thirds’ distance. Having replaced top end components overnight, the Ross-Jones family finished a plucky sixth on the day in their pristine TR4.

King and Plant were next home and outright GT2 winners in the Morgan after a topsy-turvy class tussle, pursued by the Birchenhough/Topliss Mini. Saturday’s GT2 victors Tognola/Monk retired the Porsche, concerned at excessive play in its steering, while the Harman/Crosthwaite MGB scraped home with worrying noises emanating from its gearbox on the final lap. Crosthwaite’s other ride, the Lola, fell to a broken half-shaft, while renewed clutch bothers ended the Newall/Marçais XK120’s spirited run.

The overall classification confirmed Ellis/Thomas victorious by two laps, having completed 36 each day. The amalgamation of the results, with the quickest Sports Racers up against it after Saturday’s travails, saw Drake/Baker, Spiers and Nyblaeus/Welch incredibly close on times if not on track. Eight laps down on our Sicilian champions, King/Plant were a remarkable fifth, ahead of Harman/Crosthwaite, and Ellie B and Nick Topliss. Gordon, van Lanschot/Le Blanc and the Ross-Joneses completed the top 10. Chuffed with Sunday’s win, the Maeers family’s 11th overall reflected Justin and Ben’s never say die ethos born in the Vintage Sports-Car Club.

Having brilliantly led the GT3 class in qualifying and during race 1 at the wheel of their Morgan Plus 4 SLR, until their engine went, Keith Ahlers/Billy Bellinger were awarded the coveted Driver of the Day and presented with beautiful Baltic watches from our new series partner, the GTSCC logo engraved on the rear of the watch face.

Silverstone’s Grand Prix circuit - unrecognisable from the original airfield runway venue opened in 1948, three years before the Autodromo di Pergusa - is the next rendez-vous for the GTSCC family, traditionally supported by Denis Welch Motorsport. The second of four events this season, it’s a two-hour race within the Equipe Summer Classic weekend on Sunday, June 9.

MARCUS PYE

1st Place Robin Ellis & Julian Thomas - Lotus Elan 26R 'Shapecraft'
2nd Place Chris Drake & Danny Baker - Lotus Elan 26R
3rd Place John Spiers - Lister Jaguar Costin

CONGRATULATIONS TO THE RACE WINNERS
Robin Ellis & Julian Thomas

SP1 Class Winners - Nick Finburgh & Ollie Crosthwaite - Lola Mk 1
SP2 Class Winner - John Spiers - Lister Jaguar Costin
GT2 Class Winners - Simon King & Richard Plant - Morgan +4 Super Sports
GT3 Class Winner - Nils-Fredrik Nyblaeus & Jeremy Welch - Austin Healey 3000
GT4 Class Winners - Robin Ellis & Julian Thomas - Lotus Elan 26R 'Shapecraft'
TC1 Class Winners - Ellie Birchenough & Nick Topliss - Austin Mini Cooper S
TC2 Class Winners - Rebecca Rettenmeier & Ian Nuthall - Alfa Romeo Giulia Sprint GTA
Royal Automobile Club 'Family Award' - Allan & Daniel Ross-Jones - Triumph TR4
GTSCC Baltic Watches 'Driver of the Day' - Keith Ahlers & Billy Bellinger - Morgan Plus 4 SLR

GTSCC Coppa Città Di Enna 2024

SAVE THE DATE
GTSCC Silverstone GP Circuit - Sunday 9th June
GTSCC Autumn Classic, Castle Combe - Saturday 21st September
GTSCC Algarve Classic Festival - 25/26/27 October

GTSCC END OF SEASON AWARDS LUNCH 
Saturday 7th December at The Royal Automobile Club, Pall Mall, London, SW1

E-Mail - cars@automobileshistoriques.com for entries