Why hospitality is more important than horsepower in pursuit of Le Mans

On the eve of the GT World Challenge Europe ’22 campaign commencing at Imola this weekend, Sky Tempesta Racing pulled the covers off of its car, sparkling white with familiar purple and blue trim at the team’s launch event.

The scenes looked familiar in all the ways you’d expect a livery reveal to be, shiny cloth slowly drawn back, photographers fighting for the best angles. It was all as expected except for the fact that what was uncovered was a Mercedes GT3 Evo rather than the Ferrari 488 GT3 of last season.

Obviously the silhouette was a bit of a giveaway but what isn’t so instantly obvious is the main reason behind the switch. You might think that the performance differences would be key to the decision but, in the world of GT racing, where cars are closely-matched but funding ever-scarce, it was actually Mercedes’ extensive hospitality packages and VIP opportunities that swung it for the German firm.

It was a prospect too good to pass up for the Tempesta team according to team founder and one of its three drivers, Chris Froggatt.

“Let’s say it’s really actually why we made the change,” he told Motor Sport at the team’s launch. “At the end of last year, we looked at what can we really do with Sky Tempesta Racing and outside of racing, in 2021, we missed a lot of experiences that we could give away to guests.

“A big part of what we do is giving away tickets to people to come to races, experiences, hot lap days, simulators and all sorts of things around motor sport. That had become our foundation but how can we push ourselves further? What else can we do in and around motor sport? I really want to grow the team more. Who can we partner with to give more to Sky customers, our friends and family of the team, that sort of thing?

“Mercedes was really the best choice when I looked at what facilities brands had available, and what we could do with those facilities. So take for example, Mercedes-Benz and Brooklands where we’re sat now, we’re looking at building out a programme with them for Sky VIPs throughout the year to come and do masterclass driving sessions. So that was one more step of what we can offer.”

It’s not just VIPs and customers that are willing to spend money on race weekends and events who will benefit from the switch.

Mercedes’ F1 team has its own junior motor sports programme but Tempesta’s aspirations extend to offering those hopeful young drivers a route into the sport as well as those that want to be involved in the engineering side of things.

“The next stages and the reason we moved to Mercedes was around this raising of awareness and how we engage people further. Motor sport is a relatively niche sport so it was what experiences can we give to people in the UK that will spark their interest in motor sport?

“Looking into grassroots motor sport, how we can support up and coming drivers or even drivers that don’t have the opportunity to drive at all? So we’re going to be giving away a portion of our prize money this year towards essentially a fund to support for the next year. A few drivers in karting, even Bambino karting, to give people the absolute grassroots entry point. We’re looking at engineering courses, how we can offer engineering courses for people that really don’t potentially understand that they might have this interest in GT racing.”

“A friend of mine says it’s a man not a woman – can’t multitask”

The team’s Mercedes is a new machine for the three-man line-up comprised of Eddie Cheever III, Jonathan Hui and Froggatt. The trio have been team-mates since 2020 but have exclusively driven Ferrari’s 488 GT3 since.

Last year, they claimed the Pro/Am Cup teams’ honours, with victory at the Circuit Paul Ricard 1000km along the way.

You might expect that acclimatising to a new car and new engineering team in Group M might reset expectations a bit but that is far from the case.

It’s all change as efforts have been refocused but expectations of winning the championship remain.

“We hope to win. Don’t get me wrong, this new category – the Gold Cup – is extremely competitive,” Froggatt explained. “There are some very good driver line-ups, but we have the advantage, at least from a driver’s perspective, having worked together for the last three years. That’s hugely valuable.”

Changing car after growing so familiar with the Ferrari is a risky move but one that has the potential to elevate performance and produce results in a different way according to Froggatt.

The ability to engage with VIPs has been the main reason behind the change but it comes with new obstacles for the drivers to overcome.

Differences between the Ferrari and Mercedes are vast and will require a relearning of how to get the most out of the machine.

Mercedes’ GT3 Evo is much heavier and far less ‘pointy’ as Froggatt describes but there are plenty of plus points too.

“The Mercedes is a much friendlier car to drive – what I mean by friendlier is it’s not necessarily easier, I would actually say for a thoroughbred racing driver that’s probably used to Formula cars and really high downforce, pointy cars, it’s actually counterintuitive.