Witness why we love GT3 racing while watching Shane van Gisbergen hard at work
The 2015 Highlands 101 endurance event will go down as one of the highlights of New Zealand's motorsport year, as a battle raged over the closing laps between international factory Audi champ Christopher Mies, V8 Supercar ace Shane van Gisbergen, and lesser-known V8 and GT up-and-comer Jack LeBroq.
LeBroq, behind the wheel of one of Erebus Motorsport's Mercedes SLS GT3s, headed the field leading into the race's final stanza thanks to supreme strategy and the consistent pace set by he and his co-driver Morgan Haber. But after a caution period with 20 laps remaining, van Gisbergen and Mies were quick to shut down his lead. And, like sharks circling their prey, they went to work on the 23-year-old — producing some pretty exceptional racing as a result.
In van Gisbergen's own on-board footage, which he posted raw on his own YouTube account, you can see two very different cars at play. The sledgehammer SLS thundering away down the straights, but lazy under brakes and through the corners. Chasing is van Gisbergen in the McLaren, far more pointed, focussed, and sharp than the SLS through Highlands' sweeping corners and chicanes, but no match in a straight line.
van Gisbergen summed the video up best online: “Just three dudes, full gas, on the edge [and] sometimes over. Pure racing with total respect for the other. This I why I love racing.”
Can't help but agree with that.