CALM All Porsche Trophy - Snetterton 300 Circuit
Date: 20th & 21st June 2026
Event Organiser: 750 Motor Club
Format: Qualifying, two 15-minute sprint races and a 40-minute race with a mandatory pit stop
Conditions: Warm and dry
Best Lap Time: 2mins20.921secs (set in Race 2)
Race Report
Summary: CALM All Porsche Trophy - Round 3, Snetterton 300 (20 and 21 June 2026)
Round 3 of the 2026 CALM All Porsche Trophy took VANHAUEN RACING to Snetterton in Norfolk for the fullest race programme of the season so far: qualifying, two 15-minute sprint races and a 40-minute race with a mandatory pit stop. On paper it was the ideal circuit at the ideal moment. The 300 layout rewards outright power down the Bentley and Senna straights, and the 903 arrived with the full 425bhp package and, at last, a complete set of gears.
The gear selection fault that had ruined the Donington weekend at the end of May was resolved in time for Snetterton. Phil Brough confirmed the cause was exactly as diagnosed at the circuit: a split bushing in the gearshift linkage, which had put so much play into the mechanism that fifth gear could not be engaged at all. With the bushing replaced, the shift was back to normal and the car could finally be raced through its whole gear range.
What should have been the weekend that put the 2026 development programme on the board turned into another exercise in damage limitation. From early in the weekend the 903 began to suffer persistent clutch slippage under load, and there was no way to engineer around it at the circuit. The only option was to drive around it, short shifting and keeping the car below its peak torque revs through the corners and out onto the straights, deliberately denying the engine the loads that would make the clutch let go.
The lap times tell the story with uncomfortable clarity. The weekend's best was a 2mins20.921secs, set in Race 2. The last time the 903 raced on the Snetterton 300 circuit, in June 2025, it lapped in 2mins16.711secs. In other words, a car carrying substantially more power, better brakes and a full winter of development was more than four seconds a lap slower than its own year-old benchmark. Nothing illustrates the cost of a slipping clutch more plainly than that.
By the time the 40-minute race came around, the situation had deteriorated further. The clutch was slipping at every single gear change, and the pace fell away by another five seconds a lap on top of the deficit already being carried. Nursing the car to the finish, through a mandatory pit stop, became the whole objective.
The one thing salvaged from the weekend was the result. As in previous rounds, the 903 took the Invitation Class honours, a reminder that finishing races reliably still counts for something even when the stopwatch is unkind.
Two consecutive race weekends have now been defined not by the engine, which continues to deliver everything asked of it, but by the driveline behind it. The gearshift linkage has been put right, and attention now turns to the clutch ahead of Round 4 at Brands Hatch on 12th July.
Read the full official report here.
Photo Gallery: Snetterton 300 2026
