Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe Bronze Cup

Lamborghini Factory Driver Sandy bags two top five finishes in Italy as bad luck denies winning opportunity.

Sandy bagged two top-five finishes in the opening double-header of the Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe Bronze Cup at Misano in Italy. But the 24-year-old from Forfar was left ruing a slice of bad luck which denied him a win. Reunited with his former team-mate Rob Collard for the European campaign — the duo won the British GT Championship together in 2020 — the pair piloted their No78 Lamborghini Huracan GT3 Evo 2 prepared by Barwell Motorsport and backed by Dama Fortuna Tequila.

After a difficult qualifying session, Sandy and Collard battled through the field from ninth on the Bronze Cup grid to finish fifth in the opening one-hour race on the 2.6-mile, 16-turn Misano circuit on Italy’s Adriatic Coast. Starting from fourth on the grid for the day’s second 60-minute race, held in late-evening darkness, Collard immediately catapulted himself up to second, a position he held until he pitted for the compulsory driver change. With the #78 car now just half-a-second behind the class-leading Ferrari, the duo were on course for victory. But their hopes were scuppered when there was an issue during the pitstop delaying Sandy’s progress.

“That was just one of those frustrating things which thankfully happens very, very rarely,” Mitchell, personally-backed by Huntly-based Black Bull Scotch Whisky and Tunnocks, explained. “But it was disappointing. Rob had delivered a terrific opening stint rattling off a series of fast times to move us up to second and comfortably held the position behind the Ferrari. I knew our car was fast and I was confident I had the pace to get ahead and win the race. But the delay at the pitstop knocked us back.”

Sandy rejoined in sixth place and, despite consistently lapping quicker than the Ferrari, found his progress through the cars between him and the class leader impossible. “Misano is a very tight circuit making overtaking very difficult,” he continued, “and when I rejoined I was at the back of a train of five ultra-competitive Bronze Cup GT3 cars all with the PRO drivers behind the wheel. At one stage we were all covered by just over two seconds.” Sandy crossed the line to again finish fifth. It’s not the result we were after, but we bagged a good haul of points and know we have the pace to win races in the Bronze Cup. We head to the next round at Hockenheim in July confident we’ll again be fighting for victory”

Before that, Sandy’s next European outing is the Spa 24-Hours at the end of June in the Fanatec GT World Challenge Europe Endurance Cup.