Germany’s Sven Barth (42/Eberbach) has joined the Gebhardt Motorsport team and will make his Prototype Cup Germany debut at the opening round of the 2024 season at Spa-Francorchamps. The experienced racer will share a Duqueine with youngster Maxim Dirickx (19/BEL), who is stepping straight up from karting to LMP3.
A few weeks ago, Fritz Gebhardt phoned Sven Barth and asked him whether he fancied competing in the Prototype Cup Germany with Gebhardt Motorsport. “I think the programme that Gebhardt has planned for 2024 is a really good one, with a strong first car with Markus Pommer and Valentino Catalano at the wheel, plus junior Maxim Dirickx, who will drive with me. I believe it could be a great season, especially as I am really impressed by the LMP3 cars. They are close to Formula racing, which I have always really enjoyed.”
Two coincidences brought Barth and the Gebhardt Motorsport team closer together. After a year’s break, the racing driver moved towards sports cars in 2021 and competed in the Sports Car Challenge. “That is a series intended more for amateurs; the main thing there is to enjoy motor racing.” His 2023 schedule included a race as part of the ADAC Hockenheim Historic event, where the Sports Car Challenge joined the field for the Group C Supercup. “I won the race, which meant I also finished ahead of the Gebhardt cars in my Ginetta. That was the first time we came into contact.” The second contact came just three weeks later. “Gebhardt was in Oschersleben for the Prototype Cup Germany and needed a new anti-roll bar for one of the two Ginettas. The search for spare parts led him to me, because they knew that I also have a Ginetta. Our relationship grew stronger through this coincidence.”
Barth’s motorsport CV includes multiple disciplines. After starting out in karting, the talented youngster moved into Formula racing in 2000 and soon enjoyed success. He won the Formula Volkswagen title in 2002, having ended his rookie season in this series in third place in the championship. He then moved into the newly-formed Recaro Formula 3 Cup, in which Barth finished runner-up in the Drivers’ Championship and received the trophy for the best rookie of the year. After a spell in the Formula Renault V6 Europacup, including a victory in Monte Carlo, he stopped racing on the Formula scene, with the exception of a few sporadic outings in 2004.
In the following years, Barth worked as an instructor, but was already developing a taste for sports car racing. In 2013 he switched to a GT3 car and entered the ADAC GT Masters, in which he continued to race through to 2019. “I raced for the private RWT team and we tried to take on the big teams with our Corvette. I think we did a really good job of that at times, particularly with first place at the Nürburgring alongside David Jahn in 2014, as well as seventh place in the championship in 2019 – also with David Jahn – and winning the Trophy competition in the same year. Winning at the Nürburgring was particularly special.”
Now 42 years old, Barth is not putting himself under any pressure as he lines up in the Prototype Cup Germany. Instead, he is out to enjoy himself. “It is a healthy balance against my job as managing director of a sewer rehabilitation company. I am relaxed, but also focussed on the new challenge.” And he is looking forward to the odd outing in one of the vintage race cars that Gebhardt Motorsport are working on in their workshop. “I am really up for that. I drove a Lola T294 many years ago and it was really good fun. I find it great that Gebhardt Motorsport is passionate about historic motor racing, and that they indulge in it very successfully.”
