Catching up with: Jake Hill

21-year-old Jake Hill is making his British GT debut this weekend in AMD Tuning’s Porsche 911 GT4. His weekend didn’t get off to the best of starts when a mechanical failure forced him to sit out FP1, but Hill and team-mate Graham Coomes still recovered to qualify seventh in class. The Motorsport Journal caught up with him just before qualifying.

After a brief flirtation with the BTCC at Croft in 2013, Hill has set his sights on a career in endurance racing, following the likes of newly-signed Nissan LMP1 driver Harry Tinknell.

“Harry I know personally and hats off to him, he’s done what we all wish we could do,” said BRDC Rising Star Hill. “He’s had an amazing year with Jota Sport, winning his class at Le Mans, second in the ELMS and now he’s a works Nissan driver.  So fair play, he deserves it, that’s also the sort of thing I’d love to do eventually.”

As Hill freely admits, budget has inevitably played a part in his decision. Much like Formula Ford champion Dan Cammish last season, who found his path to the ITV4 behemoth blocked by a budget shortfall, Hill has had to be pragmatic.

“The budget for touring cars for a proper team is £300,000-£400,000, but for GTs it’s more like £100,000, or maybe even less than that for certain teams,” he says. “Touring cars is great and if I got paid to do it I would love to go back there, I love touring cars and always will, but ultimately what I want to be doing is sportscars. As a professional route, the sportscar programme and GT3 will always be the way to go. We’ll just keep doing this for now, hopefully we can have a good year with AMD in their Porsche and see what the future holds.”

But despite the niggling problems with the Porsche, Hill has enjoyed every minute thus far. With former BTCC racer and team-manager Shaun Hollamby mucking in washing the wheels, Hill has relished in his new team and expects to see out the season.

“I’ve known Shaun and guys for a very long time now and I tested their touring car last year at Snetterton, they’re a great bunch, so I’ve clicked well with the whole team and with Graham as well,” he said. “He’s a good laugh and we bounce off each other; we both like the same feeling in the car, which means the team isn’t fighting to find a balance for us both and should make the car quicker.”