You’re about to race the 6 Hours of Shanghai. How has your season been up to now?

It’s been an interesting year with lots of ups and downs. We obviously had the success at Mexico in car #97 and then #95 won in Austin. There have been some highlights to the season, but also there’s been some frustration as well, like the performance of the cars at Le Mans. 

Obviously, the latest round in Fuji was a bit like that as well. We just didn’t have the performance that weekend; we started fifth and sixth, and finished fifth and sixth! There have been some real positives this year, but also some frustrating race weekends. The good thing is that, as a team, we are in a good position in the Manufacturers’ standings and Nicki (Thiim) and Marco (Sorensen) are leading the Drivers’ championship. Realistically, it’s between Ferrari and Aston Martin for the FIA World Endurance Cup for GT Manufacturers, but nothing is set yet. It means when we get to Shanghai – and Bahrain – it’s got to be all-out attack to get maximum points. So, as ever, it’s been an enjoyable year but it could have been better.

You have also competed in the European Le Mans Series in the #99 Aston Martin Vantage V8 with Alex MacDowall and Andrew Howard. It has been a rather successful season there with the LM GTE title to show for it!

Yes, it’s been a very good season with no really bad weekends. A little bit of a mistake at Spa cost us a starting position and a lap at the beginning of the race. Ultimately we could have had a podium that weekend, but that’s the only bad one we’ve had this year. Heading into Estoril, we required JMW Motorsport (#66 Ferrari F458 Italia) to have a very, very bad weekend. As we were 20 points down, we obviously needed to win and for them to have low points, or effectively not score any points at all, which is exactly what happened of course! It was a very long shot, but we won the race. The priority for us as a team was to secure second in the championship and automatic entry into Le Mans. So actually winning was an outstanding result, and I’m delighted for the whole team and for Andrew Howard (Beechdean owner, team manager and driver).

As you said, this gives you an automatic entry into the 2017 24 Hours of Le Mans, which is great news for the whole team.

Absolutely! One of the big appeals of the ELMS is that the first two in the LM GTE championship get an automatic entry into Le Mans. It’s a huge prize! Other championships offer financial reward for doing well, but an entry into Le Mans is pretty amazing. That’s why everyone is so competitive in this championship as there’s so much at stake in trying to be in the top two at the end of the year.