While Jones and Malvern’s main focus is on the Michelin Le Mans Cup in Europe this year, the cancellation of the second round of that championship – which had been set for Imola, but was struck from the calendar due to construction delays in the Italian track’s paddock – has freed up this coming weekend for Jones and Malvern to dip back into British GT.
The duo have a strong history in British GT, having raced together in the championship for seven years across both the GT4 and GT3 categories. Among their list of honours is the 2018 GT4 Pro-Am Championship title, an overall GT3 victory at Donington Park in 2020 and also an outright GT4 win at the showpiece Silverstone 500 back in 2019.
The Silverstone round always attracts a strong entry, and the three-hour race this year is no exception, boasting the championship’s biggest field for 11 years with a total of 43 cars set to start. Among that is a 24-strong GT3 entry.
While the pair raced the older-spec Porsche GT3 for the last two years, the upgrade to the new 992 variant has already shown a lot of promise. More stable and improved in almost every area, the new car carried Jones and Malvern to a podium finish during the first Le Mans Cup round at Barcelona recently, and the drivers are hopeful of a strong result on home Tarmac too.
Nick Jones says: “I’m really looking forward to the Silverstone 500 – it’s going to be a different experience for us going in without the pressure of needing to score points for the championship. It will be great to see a lot of faces in the paddock again, and also great to be back racing around Silverstone, which is a superb driver’s circuit. When we moved to the Le Mans Cup this year it was disappointing to see Silverstone clash with Imola, as it’s the first race we wanted to come back and do, but the cancellation has opened up the chance to jump back in with the new car. I think the 992 GT3 will go really well at Silverstone. It’s far more stable through both high-speed turns and under heavy braking, and there’s a lot of that at Silverstone. The grid looks hugely competitive, but it will be a bit of fun to rock up and see where we shake out in the order. If we can pull off a strong result, then all the better.”
Scott Malvern says: “It’s going to be a fun weekend for us as for once we have no championship pressure, no real expectation and can just go out there, give it our best shot and see where we end up! It’s actually all fallen into place quite perfectly, as we always said the Silverstone 500 is the one British GT race we’d love to come back and do, so with the calendar shaping up the way it has it was a no-brainer. I love Silverstone, it’s such a fast and flowing track and should suit the new Porsche 911 GT3 R 992 really well. The new car is more stable through medium- and high-speed corners so inspires a lot of confidence. There’s obviously the question of how the Balance of Performance will look for us, but I think we’ll have a great car to be in the mix with.”
The second round of the Intelligent Money British GT Championship gets underway with two practice sessions on Saturday ahead of qualifying at 16:00. Sunday’s three-hour race is scheduled to begin at 12:20. Both qualifying and the race will be streamed live on the GT World YouTube channel and live timing will be available for all sessions via TSL Timing.
