IN FIA GT CHAMPIONSHIP
American sportswoman Liz Halliday is delighted to be heading east from 16-18 September for the eighth round of the 2005 FIA GT Championship, taking place at the new Istanbul Park circuit in Turkey. Following the Formula 1 Grand Prix in August, the FIA GT round will be the second ever race to be featured at the new facility. Liz, like everybody in the GT paddock, is raring to go following the enthusiasm of the F1 circus after their successful Grand Prix weekend.
26-year-old Halliday said: “I didn’t have time to watch the Formula 1 Grand Prix on television as I was racing at Road America in the American Le Mans series that weekend. But I read the press when I returned to Europe and I saw all the positive comments from the teams and the drivers. I can’t wait to go to the new Spa! It looks amazing and it should be a great experience for me. I’m really excited.”
Ahead of her first visit to Turkey, Liz said: “I have never been to Turkey before, so I’m looking forward to discovering a new country. I also think that I will be the first woman to ever race a car in Turkey! It will be another new circuit for me, although this time it will be the same for all the drivers and we’ll start the weekend at an equal level which is good. The track is quite wide and it should be easier to overtake compared to Oschersleben.”
Following her second ALMS win at Mosport-Canada last weekend, Halliday is in a good mood: “The win on Sunday was fantastic and it was brilliant to be back on the top step of the rostrum. It is a real boost. I’m in great shape mentally and physically and the work done with the Lister team since the beginning of the year has helped my performance a lot in LMP2 prototypes. Now I hope that I can have a successful weekend in Turkey following two difficult races in the FIA GT Championship at Spa and Oschersleben. Justin Keen and the team deserve a good result and it would be great if I could reward their faith in me this weekend.”
Liz continued: “In the last two races, the Lister car was fantastically fast, Justin proved it many times, and we didn’t have any reliability issues. The chassis/engine and the Dunlop tyres are working well together and I know we have what it takes to be at the front. Justin’s last stint in Germany was unbelievable. I was impressed when he set competitive lap times, lap after lap for one hour! If we can repeat this together this weekend, we should be at the front.”
In the meantime, there is more racing for Liz Halliday. This coming weekend (10-11 September) she will be racing at the first Silverstone 24 Hours which is part of the Britcar Championship. Halliday said: “I look forward to this weekend at Silverstone with the BMW E36 and the Beechdean team. It will be a good physical preparation for me before Turkey and I hope that we can win our class.”
The brand new Istanbul Park circuit is located 6 kilometres from the junction of the north side of the TEM motorway linking Istanbul to Ankara. It is also close to the newly constructed airport Abiha Gokcen Istanbul airport (8km). Istanbul Park is on the Asian side of Istanbul and was designed by Herman Tilke, the architect behind a number of new Formula 1 circuits (Sepang in Malaysia, Shanghai in China, the new Hockenheim in Germany). The circuit, which runs anti-clockwise, is 5.333 kilometres long with a width of 14 - 21.5 metres. The circuit comprises 14 corners, six of which are to the right and eight to the left. The start/finish straight is 655.5 metres long and will enable the GT cars to reach their maximum speed.
