ROAD & TRACK - The Ginetta G55 GTA Wants to Make Sports-Car Racing Beginner Friendly

Brian Silvestro November 23, 2020

Ginetta’s push into North America aims to give fledging drivers a solid entryway into the world of sports cars.

Depending on how invested you are into the world of European sports-car racing, you may already be familiar with Ginetta. It made its debut in the late Fifties as a bespoke British carmaker, churning out a small number of competitive machines that cemented the brand a local legend. Now a full-fledged manufacturer, Ginetta offers race cars for all different levels for customers throughout the U.K. It even plans to build a road-legal hypercar in the near future. The company is finally making a push into North America with the G55, and we’ve driven it. It could be a great choice for breaking into American sports-car racing.

Before we get into how the G55 drives, it’s important to understand how Ginetta got here. After struggling financially for a number of years, the company was purchased in 2005 by Le Mans class winner and businessman Lawrence Tomlinson. His goal? Make a successful British car company. The first Ginetta under Tomlinson’s direction was the G50, an affordable, approachable GT4-class racer. The car’s popularity helped launch a spec series in the U.K., revitalizing the brand and giving way to the smaller entry-level G40, the mid-engine G58, an LMP3 prototype, and soon, an LMP1 car. There are now six Ginetta-only championships that take place in the U.K. every year, some of which run in support of the British Touring Car and British GT championships.

The G55, first launched in 2011, is a heavy refresh of the original G50. There are three trims to choose from: the entry-level GTA, the SuperCup spec-series car, and the full-on GT4 variant. Ginetta decided the GTA would be the car best suited to break into the American market. It uses the same FIA-certified roll cage and chassis as the GT4 car, but has its own suspension tuning, brakes, and drivetrain.

Ginetta’s newly established North American arm picked New Jersey Motorsports Park’s Thunderbolt course to show off the G55 GTA’s capabilities. Specifically, it picked a TrackXperienZ HPDE event—a members-only program that skews towards younger, wealthier participants. With high-dollar BMWs, Porsches, Audis, and McLarens littering the paddock, it was a perfect place to display the car to potential buyers looking to track something other than their road cars.

While the G55 doesn’t look as simple or elegant as its smaller G40 sibling, it still has a purposeful design that helps it stand out. The fanged bumper and bold headlight clusters make it easy to identify among the swaths of boring, faceless track-only sports cars you usually see at grassroots events.

The cabin is as simple as it gets, totally stripped out save for a tiny steering wheel, a digital gauge cluster, and a small selection of buttons on the dash. All of the relevant info—fuel level, temperatures, RPM, and current gear—is displayed through the screen. Even if, like me, you’ve never driven a proper race car before, it’s all extremely straightforward. There’s even standard air conditioning.

So how does the G55 GTA actually drive? In some ways, exactly like a well-tuned street car aimed at track use. In others, it’s a full-on race weapon.

The most un-street-car-like feature is the gearbox. It’s a paddle-shift six-speed sequential from Quaife that slams each gear into place in a far more aggressive fashion than any road-car transmission. The associated noise of the straight-cut gears make the ‘box seem intimidating, but once I actually got behind the wheel, it was all very natural. You only have to use the clutch to set off from a stop. While moving, the car does all of the work between gears—you don’t even have to blip the throttle on downshifts. One less thing to worry about.

The brakes are Alcon units that lack any assistance. Again, a bit scary through lap one—you have to hit the pedal hard make the car stop. But after I got used to them, I was trail-braking into turns with real precision. For a car this light, you really don't need any assistance.

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