SRO is set to act to offset a growing confidence gap in the current FIA Driver Ranking system that they believe is increasingly putting their Pro-Am class structures at risk.

One of THE talking points in current endurance racing is the issue of Driver Ranking, the current FIA-governed system an essential part of a myriad of Pro-Am centric series’, championships and standalone events with professional drivers ranked either Platinum or Gold and their non-pro counterparts as Silver or Bronze with class structures built to attempt to ensure a reasonably level playing field.

Almost from the scheme’s inception the game was afoot to find the nooks and crannies where drivers of high quality could be shoehorned into a non-Pro ranking whether via absence from the sport, a lack of ultimate qualifying criteria on their cv, or even age!

That has led to a current position where a number of high profile series and championships are hearing ever louder calls from their valued non-Pro driver customer base that the scales are now too heavily weighted against any prospect of racing success.

DSC is aware that the Blancpain GT Series team managers were briefed earlier this year that Series organisers SRO were set to submit a report to the FIA outlining these concerns and asking for action to be taken in the current process of driver rankings for the 2017 season, now due for release in provisional form as early as the end of this week with drivers then having two weeks to contest any ranking decision.

Furthermore it is now clear that such is the level of concern amongst the Blancpain GT paddock and organisers that even should there be no changes made in the process that the Series themselves will undertake a process of reclassification of drivers that they decide are not true amateur drivers, reclassifying these individuals as Gold Star and preventing their inclusion in the reckoning for the required makeup of non-professional drivers in a Pro-Am or Gentleman Cup crew.

There has been no shortage of private comment from teams and drivers on this issue from the Blancpain GT paddock with a trio of Gentleman drivers encountered by the DSC Editor in the summer all making it clear that a failure to effect change would see them leaving the Series.

Similar concerns have been voiced in the FIA WEC paddock too from several teams and drivers with one gentleman driver telling the DSC Editor in recent weeks that he was now having to consider stepping down as a driver in the best interests of his team in light of the current rapid growth of young professionals, particularly in LMP2.

“Of course it is good to see the Championship encouraging in new talent, but it is having an effect in undermining the ability of a number of long-standing competitors having an opportunity to truly compete.

“Realistically a businessman coming to do this as a serious pastime is never going to be able to go head to head effectively against a young driver making his way up the ladder and seeing LMP2 as his conduit to a professional career. That has to be looked at urgently.”