A phenomenal weekend of racing for Ryan Yardley has resulted in two solid results in Pirelli GT4 America, a class podium in GT World Challenge, and a championship victory, rewarded with a funded endurance drive through the GT Academy.
GT4 America
Race 1
Yardley and co-driver Hot were able to rebound after a tricky set of qualifying sessions, after taking ninth in class for Race 1, and twenty-fifth overall.
Hot was the elected driver for Race 1, and fell back off the start before the race was neutralised. Once the race resumed with less than fourty minutes to go, the Canadian pulled the trigger to come into the lane for a driver change.
This left Yardley with significant work to do. However, as the Kiwi does best, he was able to put his eyes forward to work his way through the pack.
With less than half an hour remaining, Yardley sat in twenty-fifth. He was quickly able to move forward, putting on some phenomenal passing moves to sit in fourteenth overall and eighth overall after fifteen minutes behind the wheel.
The Kiwi soon managed to make a move to sit sixth in class, before the Kiwi was promoted to fifth in class and twelfth overall – capping off a great recovery drive.
Race 2
Yardley was the elected driver to start Race 2, and sat in fourth overall early on. The race was quickly neutralised for a full course yellow, and fell back to eighth on the restart.
The Kiwi got caught in a fierce battle throughout the later stage of his stint, and went slighly longer to hand the car over to Hot in seventh place overall. Hot soon held a comfortable gap both in front and behind, easing some immediate pressure off the Canadian.
As the race progressed into the closing stages, the gap between Hot and the driver behind started to close. In an unfortunate end, Hot was passed by both Sam Craven and Kevin Clifford, leaving Yardley and Hot ninth overall and sixth in class.
This left Yardley and Hot with a overall finish of fifth overall in the Pro-Am standings.
GT World
In a longer eight hour endurance race, Yardley featured alongside his usual co-driver Dave Musial Jr, with an addition of Laurin Heinrich, a prominent GT driver from Germany.
The #31 car started from eleventh overall, with Musial Jr behind the wheel for the first stint.
Off the start, the American dropped down the order slightly to sixteenth, and managed to ghet the car as high as ninth when he handed the car over to Yardley with six hours to go.
The Kiwi exited the pit lane in thirteenth, when the race was neutralised as the safety car came out for an on-track incident. On the restart, Yardley quickly moved up to eleventh overall and eighth in class.
As the race progressed, Yardley was able to keep working his way forward. He soon moved into tenth, and handed the car over to Heinrich with just under five hours remaining.
Heinrich started to show some rapid pace and moved to fifth on track near the four hour mark, which left him second in class. The German managed to climb as high as fourth overall to take the class lead, before passing back over to Yardley for his second stint.
It was a quieter second stint for the Kiwi, putting on some good moves while defending well to relatively hold position. He managed to cycle to the front on strategy, and handed the car back to Heinrich with an hour and a half remaining.
The hard work done by the team earlier in the day left the trio sitting in a class podium position, and they were able to keep it clean through the night time racing to finish in sixth overall, and take an important class podium.
This effort left Yardley second in the Pro-Am championship, alongside his co-driver Musial Jr. The Kiwi’s efforts throughout the season also resulted in Yardley winning the GT Academy drivers championship, awarding him a fully funded silver tier seat for the 2027 24 Hours of Spa.
