Britain's unsung racing great: truck champ Ryan Smith guns for 9th title

Truck Racing

Eight-time consecutive British Truck Racing Champion Ryan Smith believes he's a motor sport great – will a ninth crown at Brands Hatch this weekend seal his legend?

4 2023 Brands Hatch British Truck Racing Championship 2024

Ryan Smith: Britain's true eight-time champion?

BTRC

Nobody’s won more F1 titles than Lewis Hamilton, but one British racing driver can claim to be even more successful: he’s already won eight championships.

Step forward Ryan Smith, the UK truck racer who is going for a series-record ninth consecutive British Truck Racing Championship at Brands Hatch this weekend.

When asked if he views himself up there with Britain’s racing greats, the Mansfield native simply replies: “I think so.”

Already having the most series race wins and track records at every circuit on the calendar, Smith now has his sights on stretching those consecutive glories far beyond rival Stuart Oliver’s ten titles (accrued over a much longer period).

Some might scoff at the series’s less glamorous image, but the trucker champ has done it all with his own six-man-band privateer Worldwide Truck Racing team, wrestling his 5-tonne, 1,400bhp Daimler monster to defeat the manufacturer might of MAN and Volvo.

Le Mans Ryan Smith British Truck Racing Championship 2024

Smith wrestles his 1,400bhp beast at Le Mans

BTRC

Such is his points margin this weekend, a ninth title in a row is almost a formality, but this doesn’t stop Smith confidently describing it in supersized terms.

“It’s massive,” he tells Motor Sport. “I’ve tested competitors’ trucks and been a second or two quicker than them.

“The people who I’ve worked with know how fast I am – it’s just getting that out into the mainstream is a bit difficult.”


The 15,000 people present at the likely sell-out Brands event this weekend is a start, and they are set to witness a moment of truck racing history that’s been in the making since Smith’s BTRC debut in 2014.

Back then Smith was a car dealer who used to take part in amateur drifting events in his spare time. His father had owned a truck racing team when Smith was a child, and when his brother reconnected with their past at a BTRC race years later, the other sibling hatched a plan to purchase a racing truck himself.

From the archive

By the time the weekend was through Smith had bought one – he just had to unlearn his drifting sensibilities and understand how to race a truck before making his BTRC Division 2 (its second, slower class) debut in 2014.

“I was sitting there on the grid – didn’t know what gear to be in, what lines to take, where to put the truck!” he laughs.

“It took me about 12 months to really understand how to use the torque instead of the RPM and that kind of thing.”

However, Smith says his car control, well-honed from drifting, quickly came to good use, as he claimed 15 Division 2 wins in that debut season.

“I think that’s where people get trucks wrong,” he says. “It sounds crazy, but in some ways they’re very similar to a car. A racing truck is five tonnes, but it has a similar amount of roll. It’s very stiff, and will out-drag most cars.”

The results show Smith clearly has an affinity with racing machines of a larger persuasion – as he admits.

Le Mans British Truck Racing Championship 2024

Truck on truck: not for the feint-hearted

BTRC

“Not everybody finds it, but I believe every person out there is destined to be amazing at something,” Smith says in his East Midlands drawl.

“I’ve just been lucky. I can’t hang a picture, I can’t wallpaper, I haven’t got the patience to stand there painting. But I can drive a truck!”

Such success has provoked jealousy in the truck paddock, not that it bothers Smith.

“We’ve been accused of cheating. I think it’s a big compliment”

“We get satisfaction, because we’re up against marques like MAN, and they give rivals more power, more [higher-octane] fuel,” he says. “We’ve genuinely taken it to the big boys, and we’ve been successful.

“People say they can’t understand how we do it, but we put a lot of time into developing, learning and trying to better ourselves each time.

“We’ve been accused of cheating. We’ve been accused of over-speeding, from little tiny rumours to going to scrutineers after we’ve won a race, with the bonnet up. I think it’s a big compliment. I don’t get frustrated at that.”

You have to search far and wide to find more than a few motor sport comparisons to Smith in other chosen disciplines. While Sébastien Loeb took nine consecutive WRC titles in his pomp, the Frenchman was doing so in a field of fewer champions than Smith is currently.

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“The thing is, I don’t think you can name another championship [in terms of relative quality] that’s got Stuart Oliver with ten titles, me with eight, Dave Smith’s won three and Dave Jenkins, ‘Mr Truck Racing’, who’s a champion as well having been in it for 27 years.

“There’s probably 27 years of champions still in the same series!”

Having developed his racing business to the point of becoming a professional racer, Smith does have designs on adding to his racing repertoire, including taking on heavyweight European champion Norbert Kiss – but it all has to be done while balancing the books.

“I try and explain this to the fans, because some are like ‘Ryan’s a glory hunter. He’s never going test itself against them [in the European Championship].’

“But if you look at [the joint EC and BTRC event] Le Mans, where Kiss was on a better tyre compound than us, me and him were the only ones in the 2min 05sec [lap times] all weekend on race pace.

“That should show people – but we can’t go to Europe when we’ve got €150,000 [budget], and other teams have €500,000. Racing isn’t just about winning, it’s also about getting to next season. Ideally, I’d do both European and British championships. Dakar is a dream too, but you need a budget.”

2023 Brands Hatch British Truck Racing Championship 2024

There’s likely to be fireworks on and off track at Brands this weekend

Brands Hatch

Truck racing had a strong cult following in the 1980s and ’90s, when racers like MotoGP legend Steve Parrish and former ABBA drummer-turned F1 driver Slim Borgudd thundered round race circuits designed for much smaller vehicles in front of thrilled fans. With Smith’s success and subsequent social media following, the champion’s mind has wandered towards how the sport can grow again, at a time when motor sport’s popularity in general is on the up.

“Everything gets delivered on a truck, and it’s the biggest billboard in motor sport,” he says. “It just needs promoting in the right way.

From the archive

“This sport could be humongous. I think there were 130,000 spectators in Le Mans, Germany is always over 150,000 when I’ve raced there, Brands is always a sellout.

“The BTRC is on a par with BTCC [in terms of attendance at some races], and remember, a lot of people still don’t know what truck racing is.

“With the right promoter, we could steal the lot.”

For now though, Britain’s top truck racer only has to focus on making more history – and celebrating with his signature, last-corner truck drift.

“Without being immodest or trying to big myself up, I think we own every UK track record, we’ve won the most races ever. Nobody has ever done eight on a bounce. The most anyone else has done is four, but they took championships in works trucks against independents.


“I don’t think there’s many across any other sport that’s dominated like we have.

“But I’m 42 now, not getting any younger. I want the all-time consecutive British record. Do I keep stretching it out, to leave my name up in lights? Do I want to try and get to Europe?

“You’ve just got to go with the flow and keep doing your job. Just worry about what you’re doing, and hopefully people put some respect on your name.”

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