Profile
Personal Details...
Name: Ryan Hooker
Age: 30
Birth Place: Rush Green, Romford
Lives: Upminster, Essex
Hobbies: All sports, Socialising, Snowboarding, Music, Snooker, Gym
Occupation: Racing Instructor at Palmer Sport, general 1-2-1 race tuition and coaching
Ryan's Race Career...
Ryan Hooker is a young driver who started racing at the age of 14 and is now in his 15th year of highly competitive Motorsport.
In 1994 he won two kart club championships in his first year of competing and was already starting to impress. Then, he moved up to compete in the British Kart Championships, qualifying 3rd for the series in 1997.
In 2000, Ryan made the jump into cars competing in the Porsche 924 Championship. In 2001 he finished 3rd in the championship and became CHAMPION in 2002.
2003 proved to be Ryan's best year of racing to date. . He made a big jump and moved into single seaters and competed in the Formula Palmer Audi Championship and finished a brilliant 3rd in his first year. Also, he contested 10 out of the 14 rounds of the Porsche 924 Championship and finished 3rd overall.
Ryan's ultimate aim is to compete in the famous Le Mans endurance race, with this in mind, he competed in two endurance races at the end of 2003. The first being the 6hr Birkett race, and the second being the big one, the 24hr Bathurst in Australia.
2004 Ryan raced in the British GT Cup Class Championship with Jensen Motorsport in a Corvette C5. Largely a developmental project, this proved a somewhat trying but nevertheless instructive year Ryan competed in the initial six rounds with some five points scoring positions. However, he took the difficult decision to withdraw from the final two races to reserve backing for 2005's campaign.
Throughout 2004 Ryan continued to support the Porsche 924 Championship and drove in as many rounds as his GT commitments allowed. In all Ryan competed in 9 of the 14 rounds recording an amazing 100% top score record which saw him finish the season in 3rd in the championship despite not completing a full campaign. Ryan also took part in the Uniroyal Team Challenge 25Hour Race at Spa-Francochamps finishing 47th of 133 (6th British team home).
In 2005, Ryan took part in the opening round of the British GT Championship with Xero Competition. However, with the Xero team withdrawing from the British Championship and with an offer from Emotional Engineering fielding the Vauxhall Monaro, Ryan moved to the Surrey based team for the remainder of the season. Emotional Engineering focused on a developmental year of selected British GT races and teasting. In amongst this Ryan raced with the team in the FIA GT race at Magny Cours where they won the G2 class - a debut FIA win for both the Monaro and Ryan. Ryan also competed in selected rounds of the FIA GT Championship (Silverstone and Brno) and the LMES Series (Silverstone) with Graham Nash Motorsport in the Saleen. These races were excellent introductions to the international scene and provided strong finishes: 7th in Class, FIA GT Great Britain; 10th in Class, FIA GT Czech Republic and 8th in Class, LMES Great Britain. Ryan also continued to support national racing bu competing in selected rounds of the Porsche 924 Championship. Ryan raced in the inaugral Britcar 24Hours of Silverstone in the V8 Ford Falcon of Sharpe Motorsport, recording a strong class finish. But it was the end of the year that provided a real high as Ryan competed with Juno Racing in their Juno SS3-V6 taking two dominant wins in the Britsports Winter series which sandwiched a third win when he travelled to the Gold Cup of Vallelunga with Trackspeed where partnering David Ashburn and Piers Masarati they recorded a class win in their Porsche
2006 saw Ryan compete in the British GT Championship, GTC, in the #3 Trackspeed Porsche. An eventful year saw Ryan's consistency come to the fore and finish second in the Championship (losing by 1 point!). During the season Ryan took an impressive 2 wins, and recorded 11 podiums out of 14.
2007 saw Ryan return to Trackspeed to compete in the first 6 rounds of the FIA GT3 Championsip in the Porsche 997 taking 2 Porsche class victories in the process. Ryan also competed in the 25Hr Fun Cup VW race at Belgian and in the Britcar 24Hrs at Silverstone where he raced in a BMW for the first time with Moore International. He also contested 3 rounds of the VdeV with Juno Racing, rounding the year off with a superb 2nd place at Estoril.
In 2008 Ryan has finished 2nd (though equal on points with 1st) in the VdeV UK Championship in the TFL Racing Jun0. On the way he and partner Sarah Reader scored 2 podium finishes. He scored a 100% finish record. He has also contested selected rounds of the VdeV EU Championship with Sam Allpass in the Juno SSE-CN and finished 33rd in the 25Hr of Spa UniRoyal Fun Cup.
2009 sees Ryan contest the VdeV Championship alongside Derrick Collin in a Norma with selected rounds of the UK SPEED series planned.
Click Here for Ryan's full and up to date Racing CV.
Ryan's Likes....
Food: Beans on Toast
Drink: Pineapple Juice
Restaurant: TGI's
Film: Rocky Films
Book: Perry McCarthy - flat out, flat broke
Band: Nirvana
Song: Shake a Tail Feather, Blues Brothers
Colour: Metallic Blue
Sporting Hero: Ayrton Senna
Road Car: Lamborgini Gallardo
Race car: Audi R8 LMP
Football Team: Chelsea
Magazine: FHM
Comedy: South Park
Computer Game: Call of Duty PS3
Country: Australia