The more seat time Chris van der Drift gets in the BhaiTech McLaren MP4 12C GT3 race car, the better he gets. The New Zealand sports car driver is making steady progress in the International GT Open championship and has now notched up his first class win.

Van der Drift and teammate Luiz Razia won their class in the opening race of the double header at round three of the series at the Nurburgring, June 1-2, and the pair now sit seventh outright and first in class on the championship table.

We started the race in our best ever position [third overall and first in class] and all I had to do was get the jump at the start and stay in front, said van der Drift.

At Nurburgring you have to get away fast and stay out of trouble heading into the tight hairpin thats the first corner. I hit the brakes and at the same time glanced in the mirror and saw a Ferrari all locked up and rapidly closing in on the back of the car.

I straightened the wheel and waited for the bangsure enough he ploughed into the back of me sending me off line. I managed to gather the car back up and make it through the corner. Funnily enough, I also managed to get past the guy in front and then lined up the leading car.

I got past him and ended up leading the first lap outright. However, the extra speed of the SuperGT cars soon told and I got passed again but still led the class.

At the pitstop van der Drift handed the car over to Razia who rejoined the race still leading the class and drove sensibly to bring the car home for their first win of the season after setting pole three times in the past.

The team wasnt quite happy with the speed of car during race one, but due to the quick turn around between races there wasnt much that could be done. Razia was in the hot seat for the start of race two and had to start with a 15 second handicap as per the rules (second gets pinged 10secs and third 5secs) and the only way to try and claw back some time isto take an early pit stop, which Razia duly did.

By the time I got into the car we were down to 13th and was I was thinking that trying to get past the line of cars in front might prove to be a bit messy. The engineers had improved the car somewhat. I found a good grove and started to pick the cars off in front one by one.

With three laps to go I was sixth and managed to knock off another four to finish second in class. When I crossed the line everyone was hanging over the fence and I just thought to myself that was one of my most enjoyable races ever.

Id like to thank BhaiTech and everyone else involved, it was tough at the first two rounds with the disappointing results but we made it up at Nurburgring. An almost perfect weekend, said van der Drift.

The team is immediately off to Jerez, Spain for a test session and then return June 15-16 for round four of the championship.