G-Drive Racing

G-Drive Racing

Founded	2012
Base	Moscow, Russia
Team principal(s)	Alexander Krylov
Former series	FIA World Endurance Championship European Le Mans Series Asian Le Mans Series IMSA SportsCar Championship Blancpain GT Series
Noted drivers	Mike Conway Olivier Pla Sam Bird Pipo Derani Giedo van der Garde René Rast Ryō Hirakawa Mikkel Jensen Nyck de Vries Roman Rusinov
Website	https://www.gdriveracing.com/

G-Drive Racing is a Russian sports car racing team. It is named after the commercial fuel distributed by Gazprom Neft, a subsidiary of oil giant Gazprom.^[1] They made their debut in the LMP2 class of the 2012 FIA World Endurance Championship in a partnership with Signatech, before quickly rising to prominence, winning three titles in the European Le Mans Series, taking the 2015 WEC title, as well as winning the Asian Le Mans Series twice.^[2][3] Over the years, G-Drive ran in conjunction with multiple race teams, including Jota Sport, TDS Racing, Graff Racing, and Algarve Pro Racing.^[4][5]

As a result of regulations imposed by the FIA on Russian competitors in the aftermath of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, G-Drive withdrew from international competition. They currently organise multiple sporting events in Russia.^[6] The team opened a rally raid division in 2023 for Roman Rusinov and Anastasiya Nifontova, and the former won the Silk Way Rally in the T3 category the following year.^[7][8]

G-Drive Racing at the 2018 24 Hours of Le Mans.

Racing record

24 Hours of Le Mans results

Year	Entrant	Team	No.	Car	Drivers	Class	Laps	Pos.	Class Pos.
2012	Signatech-Nissan	Signatech	26	Oreca 03-Nissan	Nelson Panciatici Pierre Ragues Roman Rusinov	LMP2	351	10th	4th
2013	Delta-ADR	Delta-ADR	25	Oreca 03-Nissan	Tor Graves Archie Hamilton Shinji Nakano	LMP2	101	DNF	DNF
	G-Drive Racing		26		Mike Conway John Martin Roman Rusinov		327	DSQ	DSQ
2014	G-Drive Racing	OAK Racing	26	Morgan LMP2-Nissan	Julien Canal Olivier Pla Roman Rusinov	LMP2	120	DNF	DNF
	OAK Racing		35	Ligier JS P2-Nissan	Alex Brundle Jann Mardenborough Mark Shulzhitskiy		354	9th	5th
2015	G-Drive Racing	OAK Racing	26	Ligier JS P2-Nissan	Sam Bird Julien Canal Roman Rusinov	LMP2	358	11th	3rd
			28		Pipo Derani Ricardo González Gustavo Yacamán		354	12th	4th
2016	G-Drive Racing	Jota Sport	26	Oreca 05-Nissan	René Rast Roman Rusinov Will Stevens	LMP2	357	6th	2nd
			38	Gibson 015S-Nissan	Jake Dennis Simon Dolan Giedo van der Garde		222	DNF	DNF
2017	G-Drive Racing	DragonSpeed	22	Oreca 07-Gibson	José Gutiérrez Ryō Hirakawa Memo Rojas	LMP2	327	39th	17th
		TDS Racing	26		Alex Lynn Roman Rusinov Pierre Thiriet		20	DNF	DNF
2018	G-Drive Racing	TDS Racing	26	Oreca 07-Gibson	Andrea Pizzitola Roman Rusinov Jean-Éric Vergne	LMP2	369	DSQ	DSQ
		Graff Racing	40		James Allen Enzo Guibbert José Gutierrez		197	DNF	DNF
2019	G-Drive Racing	TDS Racing	26	Aurus 01-Gibson	Roman Rusinov Job van Uitert Jean-Éric Vergne	LMP2	364	11th	6th
2020	G-Drive Racing by Algarve	Algarve Pro Racing	16	Aurus 01-Gibson	Ryan Cullen Oliver Jarvis Nick Tandy	LMP2	105	DNF	DNF
	G-Drive Racing	TDS Racing	26		Mikkel Jensen Roman Rusinov Jean-Éric Vergne		367	9th	5th
2021	G-Drive Racing[a]	Algarve Pro Racing	25	Aurus 01-Gibson	Rui Andrade John Falb Roberto Merhi	LMP2 (Pro-Am)	108	DNF	DNF
			26		Franco Colapinto Roman Rusinov[a] Nyck de Vries	LMP2	358	12th	7th

European Le Mans Series

Year	Entrant	Team	Class	No	Chassis	Engine	Drivers	1	2	3	4	5	6	Pos.	Pts
2016	G-Drive Racing	Jota Sport	LMP2	38	Gibson 015S	Nissan VK45DE 4.5 L V8	Simon Dolan Giedo van der Garde Harry Tincknell	SIL 1	IMO 2	RBR 3	LEC 5	SPA 5	EST 1	1st	103
2017	G-Drive Racing	DragonSpeed	LMP2	22	Oreca 07	Gibson GK428 4.2L V8	Memo Rojas Léo Roussel Ryō Hirakawa (rounds 1–2, 5–6) Nicolas Minassian (rounds 3–4)	SIL 2	MNZ 1	RBR 2	LEC 2	SPA 2	ALG 4	1st	110
2018	G-Drive Racing	TDS Racing	LMP2	26	Oreca 07	Gibson GK428 4.2L V8	Andrea Pizzitola Roman Rusinov Alexandre Imperatori (round 1) Jean-Éric Vergne (rounds 2–6)	LEC 4	MNZ 1	RBR 1	SIL 1	SPA 12‡	ALG 4	1st	100.25
		Graff		40			James Allen José Gutiérrez (rounds 1–4) Enzo Guibbert (rounds 1–2) Garry Findlay (round 4) Henning Enqvist (rounds 5–6) Julien Falchero (rounds 5–6)	LEC 6	MNZ Ret	RBR 13	SIL 12	SPA 11‡	ALG 7	12th	15.25
2019	G-Drive Racing	TDS Racing	LMP2	26	Aurus 01	Gibson GK428 4.2L V8	Roman Rusinov Job van Uitert Norman Nato (round 1–2) Jean-Éric Vergne (rounds 3–6)	LEC 4	MNZ 1	CAT 1	SIL 2	SPA 4	ALG 6	2nd	101
2020	G-Drive Racing	TDS Racing	LMP2	26	Aurus 01	Gibson GK428 4.2L V8	Mikkel Jensen Roman Rusinov Nyck de Vries (rounds 1, 4–5) Jean-Éric Vergne (round 3)	LEC 2	SPA Ret	LEC 2	MNZ Ret	ALG 1		3rd	61
2021	G-Drive Racing	Algarve Pro Racing	LMP2	25	Aurus 01	Gibson GK428 4.2L V8	Rui Andrade John Falb Pietro Fittipaldi (round 1) Roberto Merhi (rounds 2–4) Gustavo Menezes (rounds 5–6)	CAT 7	RBR 3	LEC 10	MNZ 6	SPA 7	ALG 8	6th	42
				26			Franco Colapinto Roman Rusinov Nyck de Vries (rounds 1–3, 5–6) Mikkel Jensen (round 4)	CAT 4	RBR 2	LEC 1	MNZ 8	SPA NC	ALG 5	4th	74

Notes

1. G-Drive Racing and Roman Rusinov are Russian, but both competed as neutral competitors using the designation RAF (Russian Automobile Federation), as the Court of Arbitration for Sport upheld a ban on Russia competing at World Championships. The ban was implemented by the World Anti-Doping Agency in response to state-sponsored doping program of Russian athletes.^[9]

References

1. "G-Drive withdraws from WEC, Le Mans over FIA's Russia code of conduct". www.motorsport.com. 6 March 2022. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
2. G-Drive by Signatech-Nissan
3. "G-Drive Racing". NIS Petrol i Gazprom. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
4. Kilshaw, Jake (14 March 2016). "Hignett (Jota): "The Team is Now Branded as G-Drive Racing" – Sportscar365". sportscar365.com. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
5. Dagys, John (8 February 2018). "TDS, Graff to Run G-Drive Cars; Rusinov Lineup Receives Dispensation – Sportscar365". sportscar365.com. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
6. Emma (16 February 2023). "Alexander Krylov: "G-Drive Arena has become a new attraction for Omsk"". Athletistic. Retrieved 29 March 2024.
7. Nguyen, Justin (26 April 2023). "Roman Rusinov, G-Drive Racing expand into rally raid". The Checkered Flag. Retrieved 18 July 2024.
8. "«Для меня как специалиста по кольцевым гонкам на «Шелковом Пути» сложность была в том, чтобы не сломать автомобиль» — Русинов" ["For me, as a circuit driver racing on the Silk Way, the difficulty was in not breaking the car" - Rusinov]. Match TV (in Russian). 18 July 2024. Retrieved 18 July 2024.
9. Lloyd, Daniel; Dagys, John (13 August 2021). "Le Mans Friday Notebook". SportsCar365. Archived from the original on 13 August 2021. Retrieved 12 September 2021.

External links

• Official website