Mark Sumpter was a frustrated man after the sixth round of the FIA GT Championship at Spa-Francorchamps.

Sumpter and his team-mates were looking to bounce back from a series of problems in their Paragon Porsche-backed 911GT3RS.

With a race plan that should have reaped major rewards, a driveshaft failure before the two-hour mark put the car out of the classic 24-hour endurance challenge at the famous Belgian track.

Sumpter, from Five Ashes in East Sussex, said: "It's just not going right for us at the moment.

"Our whole strategy was to be reliable and even in qualifying we were taking it easy on the car.

"I think we could have gone really well because a lot of the race was run in wet conditions and all four of our drivers are good in the wet."

Sumpter, Mike Jordan, David Jones and Godfrey Jones had teamed up to race one car in the marathon, which drew more than 50 cars to the Spa-Francorchamps circuit.

With a 24-hour race to come, the team elected to take a conservative approach to qualifying which left them 13th in the N-GT category.

Sumpter said: "It wasn't our plan to attack in qualifying, we just wanted to get into the middle of the pack. The car was spot on in qualifying, it was brilliant."

With a fresh engine and gearbox fitted for the race, the prospects of a strong run looked good.

However, disaster struck just after the first routine pit stop as David Jones took over from Jordan after an hour and a half of racing. On his out lap from the pits, Jones had a driveshaft break.

Sumpter said: "It happened on the way out of La Source and David had to coast down the hill before pulling off at Eau Rouge.

"Despite valiant attempts by David to repair the car sufficiently to get it back to the pits, we were forced to retire."

There is now a break in the championship before round seven at Anderstorp in Sweden on September 6 to 7.

That will be followed by trips to Oschersleben in Germany and Estoril in Portugal before the series reaches a climax in Italy at Monza on October 18 to 19.

Brighton's Mike Webb returns to action in his own car at Mallory Park this weekend.

Webb finished 11th in the last round of the Hot Hatch Championship at Pembrey in Wales despite having to race in a borrowed car.

His own Escort could not be used due to a broken shaft bearing and damaged gear shaft which were only discovered during qualifying.

However, Webb hopes to have the car fixed and back in action in Leicestershire this weekend.