When the great British summer is in full bloom, there’s not many places that works Aston Martin racing driver Darren Turner would rather be than blasting around Silverstone in an open-top sportscar chasing podiums… and as luck would have it, that’s precisely where he found himself last weekend.
Turner, who spends most of his time competing with the latest state of the art Aston Martin Vantage GT3 for The Heart of Racing team or developing the British brand’s next generation of high-performance road cars, still can’t resist stepping back into the sport’s history when the opportunity beckons.
And so it was with no small amount of glee that he returned to the cockpit of the pre-war Aston Martin LM4. The little 1.5-litre Irish Grand Prix winning speedster is restored and prepared by Ecurie Bertelli on behalf of its owner Jonathan Lupton, and Turner was invited to participate in the Aston Martin Owner’s Clun-run St John Horsfall Trophy race, held on the British Grand Prix venue’s national circuit.
“I do love racing those pre-war cars,” said Turner, “They are always so much fun to drive, because they are challenging, they make you think, they are faster than you imagine they should be and they drift around the circuit in a way that really brings a smile to your face.”
The field was comprised of 17 beautiful Aston Martins split into either two-litre or 1.5-litre engine configurations. And while the national circuit’s long straights naturally favour the larger capacity powered machinery, Turner qualified fourth, a little over a second off the pole time and the fastest 1.5-litre car in the field.
“For me it was all about trying to hang on to those 2.0-litre cars up at the front,” said Turner.
A good old-fashioned standing start preceded a typically frantic opening lap, as more powerful cars charged through from lowly qualifying slots and others made errors in front of him, thus Turner found himself running third for the majority of the 12 lap race.
“I had a lovely time trying to keep up with the two leading cars,” said Turner. “I reckon if the race had been 30-minutes long, I might even have had a chance of winning the race, because it was a hot day and they were starting to make a few mistakes. These cars are quite physical to drive!
“As the race progressed I could see that I was getting closer and closer to them, but I just ran out of time.”
Still, it’s not every driver that can say they’ve finished on the podium twice in the space of a month with two different Aston Martin’s built nearly a century apart!
As Turner then went off to celebrate his success in the BRDC Clubhouse, his team-mate Lupton set about taking on all-comers in the BDC Scratch & Pre-War Challenge race.
“Jonathan improves more and more every time he steps in the car,” said Turner. “And he did a great job out there mixing it up with the more powerful machinery. It’s fun to watch the progress Jonathan is making.”
Lupton, who started from 16th on the grid raced his way up to 11th overall and ninth in the Pre-War class of the race, before then stepping in to his 1950’s Aston Martin DB2 to finish P13 in class for the Peter Mann Trophy pit-stop race.
Turner now flies back to the United States to participate on the glorious Road America circuit for Rounds nine and 10 of the GT World Challenge America with The Heart of Racing alongside Gray Newell, this weekend.