BROWN/MEAKIN RETURN TO WINNING WAYS IN GT4
GT3: 2 Seas crew benefits from Martin’s yellow flag infringement
GT4: Late Safety Car period plays perfectly into Optimum’s hands
Barwell’s post-race penalty handed victory to 2 Seas’ Kevin Tse and Maximilian Götz in the second of Sunday 's British GT Championship races at Snetterton, while Optimum’s Jack Brown and Zac Meakin scored a timely GT4 victory to move back into the overall class lead.
Alex Martin and Sandy Mitchell looked set to take control of this year’s GT3 title battle by claiming their second victory in the day. But a subsequent drive-through converted to 30 seconds post-race for Martin overtaking under yellow flags dropped their Lamborghini to 10th in the final classification.
RAM Racing’s John Ferguson passed Mark Radcliffe at the restart to claim what looked set to be the final podium position alongside stand-in co-driver Max Hesse. That would have become second with #78’s penalty, but a post-race incident involving team representatives and Race Control officials resulted in both its GT3 and GT4 cars being excluded from the meeting. Race 1’s result and points have also been amended accordingly.
That meant Barwell’s other title-chasing Lamborghini driven by Rob and Ricky Collard finished second overall, and Optimum’s McLaren of Mark Radcliffe and Tom Gamble third.
Meanwhile, Meakin and Brown benefitted from the late Safety Car period to beat title rivals Jamie Day and Mikey Porter to GT4 victory. Their Forsetti team-mates Marc Warren and Will Orton also remain firm championship contenders after completing the podium and taking Pro-Am victory.
The first of 2024’s drivers’ crowns were also awarded to Shaun Balfe and Ad
am Smalley (Garage 59) who wrapped up GT3 Silver-Am with two races to spare. They took the chequered flag in sixth but ultimately finished fourth.
GT3: 2 SEAS TAKE ADVANTAGE
Barwell had twice before overcome maximum Compensation Time to win both sprint races at Snetterton. And Martin and Mitchell were on course to make that three occasions until a post-race penalty handed the result to Tse and Götz.
Mitchell shared the front row with Phil Keen and duly retained his lead into Riches on lap one. Götz and Gamble also held station behind while Sam Neary dropped five places to 10th after initially losing fifth to Callum Macleod.
Hesse took sixth from Ricky Collard halfway through the opening stint, but that was the only development of note before the pitstops commenced.
Mitchell beat Keen to pole by less than a tenth yesterday, but the Lamborghini was able to gap the Mercedes-AMG in race trim. Indeed, the Scot was just over 11 seconds clear by the time all Pros pitted together at the end of the window.
That appeared to be sufficient for Mitchell’s co-driver Martin to retain the lead after serving the car’s extra 10 seconds of Compensation Time. 2 Seas had other ideas, though, and pushed Keen’s co-driver Loggie back from his pitstop into the Lamborghini’s path.
Loggie led for less than a lap before Race Control imposed a drive-through penalty for the altercation.
Martin was now back in the lead and able to edge clear of Tse who also benefitted from his team-mate’s penalty. But a four-second gap was eroded when the stationary Toyota GT4 triggered a Safety Car period with just under 20 minutes remaining.
Barwell’s cause was aided by the three GT4 cars between Martin and Tse when racing resumed. And it was that cushion which gave the Lamborghini a straightforward run to the chequered flag over the final five minutes despite Martin appearing to back off on the final lap.
Ultimately, though, that will be a footnote in British GT 2024’s Snetterton chapter, which was subsequently re-written to record a 2 Seas victory after Barwell’s post-race penalty.
Tse finished well clear of RAM’s BMW, which just held off Collard in Barwell’s charging #63 Lamborghini. That car pitted from seventh and was hampered by both seven seconds of Compensation Time and an extra five for an on-track incident involving Ricky and Neary. But a combination of the Safety Car and Rob’s overtaking – which included a particularly impressive move on Radcliffe – culminated in fourth at the chequered flag and second in the final reckoning. Such circumstances could yet prove crucial in this year’s title battle.
Optimum’s McLaren shared by Radcliffe and Gamble finished third ahead of Balfe and Smalley whose sixth Silver-Am win in seven starts helped to seal the class crown. Blackthorn’s Giacomo Petrobelli and Jonny Adam were eventually classified fifth, and Greystone GT’s Mike Price and Macleod completed the revised top six.
Further back, contact with Paddock’s McLaren resulted in a further 40-second penalty for 2 Seas’ #6 Mercedes-AMG in lieu of a 10-second stop-go.
GT4: BROWN WINS AGAIN AT SNETT
Jack Brown loves Snetterton. Having been a race winner at the Norfolk track in both 2022 and ‘23, the Optimum driver completed his hat-trick in Race 2 in a superb showing alongside team-mate Meakin.
With no Compensation Time to worry about after the pair’s eighth place earlier in the day, the only thing pole-man Meakin was concerned about was building enough of an advantage to stave off the chasing Pro-Am runners behind, all of whom would enjoy shorter pitstops.
Meakin duly put in a great performance to convert pole into the lead ahead of Jordan Albert’s Steller Motorsport Audi and the twin Forsetti Aston Martins driven by Orton and Day, respectively. All four were aided by the collision between Race 1’s top two Charlie Robertson and Freddie Tomlinson that eliminated Century’s BMW and DTO’s Ginetta at the end of lap one.
Knowing he’d have an extra 14 seconds to spend in the pits against both the Audi and Orton’s #47 Aston, Meakin got the hammer down and forged a near-six-second advantage by the time the pit window opened. The Pro drivers often stay out until the end of the 10 minutes, but Meakin pitted at the first opportunity to hand over to Brown and rely on his out-lap pace to narrow the deficit.
The plan worked nicely, as Brown filtered back into the order third – right behind the two Pro-Am cars now driven by Warren (Forsetti) and new race leader Tim Docker (Steller).
Brown pulled a neat move into Murrays to pass Orton, and then set about chasing down Docker. His cause was aided when the only Safety Car period of the weekend was required to recover the Toyota Gazoo Racing UK Supra, which had stopped at the side of the track with an engine issue. That put Brown right on Docker’s tail, and he breezed past into a lead he’d never lose as soon as racing recommenced.
But the late caution period also bunched the pack, which resulted in Docker picking up race-ending damage during an incident on the exit of Agostini.
Porter then slipped past Warren to head Forsetti’s two-three, with Warren and Orton claiming the Pro-Am honours in third overall.
Seb Morris and Charles Dawson capped a strong weekend with fourth overall and second in Pro-Am aboard Team Parker’s Mercedes-AMG. Erik Evans and Marco Signoretti’s Academy Mustang finished fifth ahead of Ian Duggan and Gordie Mutch in the #20 Mahiki Racing Lotus.
Alex Walker and Adam Hatfield were seventh in Paddock’s McLaren, while RAM’s exclusion saw Paddock’s other GT4 entry shared by Ed McDermott and Matt Cowley complete the top eight.
British GT’s endurance format returns next time out at Donington, which hosts the eighth and penultimate round of the season on September 7/8.
