FIA GT, Silverstone – GT4 Race Two Osborne & Broadhurst Take A Classic Win Yes, you read it right – the words “GT4” and “Classic” in close proximity! The FIA GT4 European Cup has rarely delivered much that is memorable, but Sunday morning’s race produced great racing that was as good as you’ll find anywhere. The opening stages of the race gave no hint of the dramas to come, after a start-line shunt saw Saturday’s winner, the #4 Team WFR Ginetta, and the #18 BMW come to grief. It wasn’t easy to see what precipitated the incident, but Jody Firth was greatly aggrieved after being squeezed to the point that he hit the pit wall nose-first and was then collected by the Beemer. The blue car stopped at almost the exact same point on the track as the LNT Ginetta had done at the start of last year’s Britcar 24 and the safety car was scrambled for three laps to allow the recovery of the cars and the mopping up of various lubricants.
Almost obscured in the melee was the fact that the lead had already changed hands, after Michael Simpson got the drop on pole-sitter Michael Mallock’s Aston in the #51 Ginetta as the lights changed, before himself losing the lead to Alex Buncombe’s RJN Nissan before the caution was declared. At the restart, with 28 minutes remaining, Buncombe began to pull out a small gap on the rest and the fun was about to begin. Behind the Nissan, Mallock was catching Simpson for second, but had Hunter Abbott right behind him as the #6 Ginetta sought to stake a claim on third; and, behind these four, Michael Broadhurst in the #52 G50 was having a great scrap for fifth with Matt Hamilton’s #5 Ginetta. The safety car period meant that the race had already arrived at the pit stop window, and Mallock decided to stop staright away, to take advantage of the fact that the cars were still closely bunched. As he did this, Hamilton took position from Broadhurst and was now fourth. Buncombe’s lead over Simpson had extended to 2.190s by lap nine, at the end of which he pitted, along with Abbott. Denis Donkervoort had picked up a stop/go – presumably for passing under yellows – and stopped to take his penalty. But instead of rejoining the track, he drove to his pit for his regular stop – which is prohibited. As the crew readied the car to rejoin, two officials stood in front of the car and prevented it from rejoining. After much throwing up of hands and shaking of heads, the crew and officials walked away and eventually the driver got out. When all stops had been made, it emerged that Stewart Linn was now leading in the #51 LNT Ginetta, from Lucas Ordonez in the #14 Nissan, from Kevin Veltman in the #17 BMW M3, from Joe Osborne in the #52 Ginetta.
Veltman’s BMW clearly had much more straight-line grunt than the Ginettas, but was considerably less nimble through the corners; hence, the balance of power kept passing between the cars – the Nissan being somewhere in the middle. As Osborne and Veltman traded third, Linn and Ordonez were having a similarly close battle, until the Nissan ran wide at Priory and dropped to fourth. Alas, Michael Mallock’s race was run as he brought the RS Williams N24 into retire with brake problems. The cars at the front had swapped adversaries, with Linn and Osborne now fighting for the lead and Veltman and Ordonez scrapping for third. As the cars arrived at priory on lap 11, Osborne saw a gap and timed his challenge perfectly. As the #52 started to pull away, Veltman caught Linn at Copse on lap 12 and was through into second. Again, though, his advantage on the straights was negated in the corners and Linn hung on to his coat-tails; but it also meant that Ordonez could again catch up. Tom Dunstan, in the #5 Team GCR Ginetta, was making hay while the sun shone; taking advantage of the in-fighting ahead to catch up, and by lap 13 just five seconds covered first to fifth. All of the action was taking place at the front, while the rest of the field drifted further and further apart. The Donkervoort challenge imploded in Supersports, leaving Augustin Eder to take a very lonely class win in his KTM Xbow. As the race entered the last ten minutes, Dunstan tried a passing move on Ordonez which ended in momentary tears – the Nissan driving through the gravel before rejoining, and the Ginetta spinning.
Linn, meanwhile, was still applying huge pressure to the Dutch BMW, Veltman holding a huge slide out of Club and managing to stay ahead (even having the presence of mind to hit the hazard lights); but the cars were side by side again through Maggotts on lap 15, with Linn in the right place to take the place out of Vale. The Ginetta hung on through Abbey, and Ordonez took advantage of Veltman’s loss of momentum to take third at Woodcote. But Joe Osborne was in full control of his own destiny and he completed the 17th and final lap at reduced pace to cross the line three and a half seconds ahead of Stewart Linn to take the win to the huge delight of Michael Broadhurst on the pitwall. Ordonez took third for RJN ahead of Veltman and Dunstan in fifth. Vladimir Hladik rounded out the top six in the #44 N24. This had been a very entertaining race and showed that the class could indeed produce the goods when it mattered. More of the same, please.
Provisional result 1 52 GT4 Broadhurst/Osborne Ginetta G50 17 laps 40:25.643 2 51 GT4 Simpson/Linn Ginetta G50 17 laps +6.294 3 14 GT4 Buncombe/Ordonez Nissan 350Z 17 laps +7.375 4 17 GT4 Kevin Veltman BMW M3 17 laps +9.317 5 5 GT4 Hamilton/Dunstan Ginetta G50 17 laps +10.927 6 44 GT4 Vladimir Hladik Aston Martin GT4 17 laps +21.754 7 6 GT4 Abbott/Fletcher Ginetta G50 17 laps +24.635 8 23 GT4 Palmer/Pearson Nissan 350Z 17 laps +56.888 9 3 GT4 Alexander Pugachev Aston Martin N24 17 laps +1:20.674 10 108 SS Augustin Eder KTM Xbow 17 laps +2:10.200 11 104 SS Nico Pronk Donkervoort D8GT 16 laps Not Classified 32 GT4 Michael Mallock Aston Martin GT4 10 laps D.N.F. 102 SS S Wintenberger Donkervoort D8GT 10 laps D.N.F. 103 SS Denis Donkervoort Donkervoort D8GT 8 laps D.N.F. 50 GT4 Firth/Moore Ginetta G50 0 laps D.N.F. 18 GT4 Mena/Grammatico BMW M3 0 laps D.N.F. Fastest Laps 14 GT4 Buncombe/Ordonez Nissan 350Z 2:03.200 102 SS S Wintenberger Donkervoort D8 GT 2:05.031 MH | 
