Race Report for Round Seventeen - Sprint Race
GT3 battle spectacular in shortened Brands Hatch sprint race
Plenty of action up and down the field in a slightly shortened sprint race on Saturday at Brands Hatch. Sam Neary made a fantastic start to keep Michael Igoe at bay off the line. The two GT3 machines quickly started to break away from the rest of the field, leaving Tom Webb to lead the best of the rest.
Igoe chased as hard as he could, even recovering from fifth place at one point back up to second, but he couldn’t catch the flying Mercedes. The race ended prematurely following an incident at Druids for the #79 Team Hard Ginetta, bringing out the red flag. Third in GTO went the way of Shamus Jennings and G-Cat Racing.
Tom Webb finished third overall, and claimed GTC honours. Dan de Zille finished second on the group for FF Corse, ahead of the sister car in the hands of Laki Christoforou.
Despite a few gravelly moments, Sander Mortensen finished eighth overall while also finishing top of group GTB. The ‘giant-slayer’ Marcos Mantis ended up ahead of MAS Motorsports’ Mike Sellar and 24-7 Motorsport’s David Frankland.
Team Hard may have lost one car, but the #21 Ginetta took the win in group GTH. With eleven minutes to go, Josh Jackson made a move early on over Steve Ruston and made it stick, relegating the #44 McLaren into second place. Third in the group was Spy Motorsports’ Brent Millage.
GTA suffered a 50% dropout rate, losing both the #79 and the #8 BMW from Geoff Steel Racing during the race. Winning GTA was newcomer Adam Lucas, in his first GT Cup outing. The #14 Ginetta finished ahead of Fraser Smart in the #41 Lotus Evora, following the Lotus’ group move from GTB to GTA.
