Gigawave hoping for more success

6:38am Friday 4th July 2008

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Now just five points off the FIA GT Championship leaders, Gigawave MotorSport head to Oschersleben in Germany for round four, hoping to continue its excellent start to the season in picking up two podiums and a top-six finish.

If they perform strongly at races, cars are given extra ballast in subsequent rounds and the Earls Colne-based team received the handicap at their last outing at Adria in Italy.

However, after a good finish in Adria, with 40kg of success ballast, Gigawave the only British outfit competing in the GT1 class of the FIA GT Championship, are back on level terms for Oschersleben, having shed the extra weight thanks their valiant sixth place in Italy.

Gigawave's drivers know the importance of this weekend's race because the cars will not be handicapped for a high finish for the next round.

Driver Allan Simonsen said: "This is the crucial race because the cars are not handicapped for the Spa 24 Hours (which follows Oschersleben at the start of August), so a good result at Oschersleben will not count against us later on.

"Adria showed how the extra ballast can hold the car back so we need to capitalise on this."

With Gigawave's Aston Martin DBR9 prefering faster more open circuits, car set-up is key for round four and fellow driver Philipp Peter believes the team can take advantage of what was learned at the previous race.

"Oshersleben is a small circuit, like Adria but it has one fast corner that will benefit us," he said.

"We will take a lot from the previous round in terms of car set-up for a tight, twisty circuit and we have a good set up for the car which should maximise the DBR9's performance."