By Michael Satterfield
The internet car community has been abuzz about a new racing driver, Russian businessman Vadim Kogay, who is the definition of a gentleman racer, a millionaire who just wants to go racing. While many gentleman racers will stick to club racing or track days, Vadim bought a Ferrari and went to the 3 hours of Monza in the
Blancpain Endurance Series Pro Am Cup. Talk about living the dream, piloting a Ferrari in Monza is something few people in the world will ever do.
The stories on the internet would have you believe, that he signed a check and drove on to the track for the first time.... Some stories are painting the picture that the guy has never ever raced before and should be completely removed from the sport. I disagree.
While it is clear he needed more seat time in the Ferrari 458 GT3, it was not his first time racing. According to the
International GT Open website he started racing in 2012 in GT. He spent most of 2013 in International GT driving a Porsche 997 GT3 R. While he has not been a frontrunner it is still impressive to have finished races at Nürburgring, Silverstone, Monza and the like. He has also raced in a Porsche in the Spezial-Tourenwagen-Trophy Series where he had a podium finish. We have reached out to Mr. Kogay to get his side of the story and we hope we will get more details on what went wrong.
Just remember how many of us would not love the chance to drive a 458 GT3 around Monza in an endurance race? I think Vadim is living the dream, I just hope that he gets a few more practice laps in before his next race.
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