Catsburg: TF Corvette Facing “More Difficult” Task at Spa

Photo: Julien Delfosse/DPPI

Nicky Catsburg believes fighting for LMGT3 class victory in this weekend’s 6 Hours of Spa-Francorchamps will be a “more difficult” task given the success handicap his No. 33 TF Sport Chevrolet Corvette Z06 GT3.R is carrying.

The Corvette factory driver, in his first race back in the world championship since winning the 2023 GTE-Am title, came 0.265 seconds from the class win in last month’s season opener in Imola, which went to the No. 69 Team WRT BMW M4 GT3 EVO of Dan Harper, Parker Thompson and Anthony McIntosh.

Catsburg set the 12th quickest time in Thursday’s opening Free Practice session in the car he’ll again share with Jonny Edgar and Blake McDonald, although faces s 24kg increase in minimum weight due to their podium in Italy.

“If I’m judging FP1, I feel like it’s going to be more difficult than I anticipated with the weight,” he told Sportscar365. “We really seem to have a bit of a deficit because of it.

“So it’s probably going to be tough to fight for the same positions as we did in Imola.

“Let’s see how we develop into the next practice. But FP1 was difficult.

“But we should just try and extract the most out of it, make no mistakes and get somme good points again.

“The way to win a championship is to just not have so many big bad results. That should be our plan here.”

Catsburg, Keating and Nico Varrone won the final GTE-Am title with Corvette Racing in a season that saw class wins at the 1000 Miles of Sebring, 6 Hours of Portimao and 24 Hours of Le Mans, as well as runner-up class finishes at Spa and Fuji.

“For sure, it’s about consistency and not having zero point races,” said the Dutchman. “We need to be careful and getting it to the finish than that final position.”

Catsburg, who holds considerable experience with the GT3-spec Corvette not only in the WeatherTech Championship but also Intercontinental GT Challenge competition with multiple customer teams, said the biggest adjustment to LMGT3 is adapting to the Goodyear tire.

“I was expecting to hit the ground running and lean on my experience but the tire is so different and I haven’t really driven it before Imola,” he said.

“I’m still learning about the tire and I feel that’s going to take some time, as opposed to Charlie [Eastwood] or Jonny and stuff like that.

“But it’s really cool to be back. It’s an awesome paddock and I always feel like when just do IMSA, you miss WEC. When you just do WEC, you miss IMSA.

“So it’s better to just do both. I’m a lucky guy with that. But it’s really nice to be back.

“There’s some cool track, Imola I hadn’t been to in a while, Spa is obviously I do in GT World Challenge but not in WEC so I had to remind myself today to get out of the pit lane [at the top of the hill] and not all the way down there.

“But it’s a pleasure to be back.”

John Dagys

John Dagys is the founder and Editor-in-Chief of Sportscar365. Dagys spent eight years as a motorsports correspondent for FOXSports.com and SPEED Channel and has contributed to numerous other motorsports publications worldwide. Contact John