British GT, Spa – Race 1 Report
Westbrook Prevails The approach to Spa on race day was considerably less promising, weather-wise, than it had been the previous morning, but the overnight rain had moved on to other parts of Europe by the time the combined BGT/Aston Martin Challenge/EuroBenelux GT4 grid assembled for the first of the day’s two one-hour races. Immediately noticeable, sadly, were two gaps on the grid where BGT Ferraris should have stood. The GT3B MTECH Ferrari of John Dhillon and Aaron Scott had been rebuilt overnight following its qualifying shunt, but the team then discovered a crack in the steering column about an hour before the race was due to start. The repairs meant that the #21 430 would have to stay in the awning for a while longer yet, leaving Dhillon all dressed up with nowhere to go. The second absentee was the Chad Racing Ferrari Scuderia of Iain Dockerill and Tom Ferrier. Dockerill had barely begun his outlap when a driveshaft failure left him helpless by the side of the road. The lime green car would not be seen again that day, but at the least the drivers could console themselves with races in the BTCS and in the 25H Fun Cup. It was the VW Beetle enduro’s scheduled start time which demanded that the first race should begin at 09.40 – no warm-up this time out – but the remaining runners all got away without incident for the pace lap and the combined grid made for a wonderful sight. In stark contrast to the start at Brands Hatch – where the Pace Car driver clearly believed himself to be leading a race – the filed was brought through the Bus Stop so slowly that a large section of the grid actually had to stop as those ahead filtered through the chicane. Things were fully ship-shape by the time the field approached the lights, however.  |
The 60 minutes began with Michael Lyons immediately challenging pole-man Chris Goodwin to a drag-race to La Source. But the McLaren development driver had the inside line, as well as enough speed to place the orange MP4-12C in the optimum position for the corner, and he rounded the hairpin still in the lead. Lyons was forced wide at the same moment and David Ashburn had no hesitation in taking the #1 Trackspeed Porsche past the #5 Scuderia Vittoria Ferrari 458 and into second. Gregor Fisken also made ground in his Porsche on the opening lap, moving the #2 997 R ahead of Duncan Cameron’s #21 MTECH 458, while several other positions were exchanged midfield in the opening stages. In GT4, Dan Denis had the luxury of starting his race from pole with several non-BGT cars between himself and his class pursuers, led by Ollie Jackson in the #48 Lotus Evora, and he made sure that it stayed that way as the race began. Lyons retook second from Ashburn on Lap 2 and looked set to begin getting to grips with the two second lead on the Invitation class McLaren. Two laps later, however, it was the Porsche that again completed the lap in second place; and this time the #5 Ferrari was nowhere to be seen. As the field streamed across the line, a very slow car was gradually coming in to view, and it was soon apparent that this was the 458. Lyons nursed the car back to the pitlane where it crabbed its way back to its garage, something clearly amiss with the rear suspension. It transpired that a rear tow link had snapped at Stavelot, sending the car into a spin, but fortunately not into the barriers. The car did make it back into the race after losing six laps and would go on to record a classified finish, but this was scant consolation. Hector Lester had dropped from 11th to 13th on the opening lap, but had recovered to tenth by the end of Lap 2. Soon afterwards, however, Mike Guasch – recovering after being tapped into a spin by Jim Geddie at the first corner (the Scot later apologising to the American for his error) – found his way past the #3 Ferrari in the #23 Audi; and then progressed one more place when Lyons hit trouble. Fisken had taken third from the #22 Preci-Spark Mercedes SLS of David Jones shortly before the #5 Ferrari dropped back, which meant that we now had both Trackspeed cars at the head of the GT3 field, but behind the McLaren. Cameron, meanwhile, was getting to grips with the 458 and challenging Fisken for third. Having found his feet once more, Guasch was soon tailing the #11 CRS Ferrari 458 of Andrew Tate and took seventh on Lap 6, splitting the two CRS cars in the process. Geddie snr was a good eight seconds further up the road at this point in the #10 458 and preoccupied with battling the SLS for fifth. The Scot later admitted that he had to take some deep breaths through Eau Rouge – the scene of a major accident for him in a Porsche – but he put the negative to the back of his mind and went by the silver car on Lap 8. The race had lost the #24 United Autosports Audi on the sixth lap when Jay Palmer hit oil and hit the barriers - the damage being race-ending, but repairable – and we almost lost the #6 Speedworks Corvette Z06 R a lap later; “I was having a good run, but was finding that the car was fast in all the wrong places,” said Ron Johnson. “It was so quick through Eau Rouge compared to the Aston and Ferrari ahead that I almost ran into the back of them; but then I’d just get mugged along the Kemmel straight. I had a go at Les Combes, but overcooked it and spun.” Fortunately the big car was able to continue with only a few seconds lost. The leaders were already amongst the Benelux GT4 backmarkers, and this had the effect of closing up the top four to 5.754s after eight laps. In British GT4, meanwhile, Denis was still leading in the #50 Ginetta by seven seconds from Jackson in the #48 Lotus, with Freddy Nordstrom three seconds behind in third in the #49 Evora. The pit window opened a few seconds after the leading cars started their tenth lap. This fell perfectly for the #12 CCTV Ferrari of Phil Burton and Jackson’s Lotus, which both arrived in the pitlane as the window opened. Both, however, were about to lose out. Mike Guasch radioed back to his team that there was “oil everywhere!” and almost immediately the timing screens indicated that the Safety Car was being scrambled. A Dutch GT4 Ginetta had come to grief in a big way at the entry to Pif Paf – the driver apparently uninjured – and the clear-up would take some time. The appearance of the Safety Car prompted the majority of the field to stop, and almost unnoticed in the drama was the fact that David Ashburn had entered the pitlane ahead of Chris Goodwin – signifying perhaps that the McLaren had found some of the oil? The Preci-Spark Mercedes stayed out a further lap before pitting. One very noticeable piece of data on the timing screens was that of the #3 Ferrari’s pitstop time – 57 seconds. With the next quickest stop being 72 seconds, there was a strong suspicion that the Rosso Verde car had mistimed things. The Safety Car indicated that it would come in at the end of Lap 13, with the restart order being: 1, 21, 10, 59, 2, 7, 3, 11, 23, 6, 12, 22, 50, 49, 42, 48, 44, 47 and 5. The Stark Racing Ginetta G55 of Ian Stinton and Michael Simpson pitted after 11 laps, but failed to re-emerge. The Century Motorsports G55 had expired on only the second lap and neither car was destined to start the second race later that day. This had been a very difficult weekend for the GT3 Ginetta, but it is to be hoped that the ‘summer break’ allows the factory to iron out the gremlins before the series goes to Rockingham in September. As the Safety Car headed down the pitlane Richard Westbrook, now aboard the #1 Trackspeed Porsche, floored it and headed for La Source. Behind him, though, was an awful lot of empty space; the result of an interloping Dutch Aston Martin being unable to keep pace. Matt Griffin could do nothing in the #21 MTECH Ferrari but stay behind through the Bus Stop, and could only press the throttle when the Aston pulled over at the start of the pit straight; by which point he was already 4.983s behind. With only 20 minutes remaining, it looked as though a classic finish to the race had been ruined by circumstance; but the gap was down to 3.556s a lap later, and 2.262s a lap later still – Griffin was catching him! As the gap came down, the suspicion formed that Westbrook was perhaps allowing Griffin to close in an attempt to draw the Irish driver into using the best of his rubber, but this was apparently not the case; “I needed those five seconds at the start,” said Westbrook later. “The Porsche is not a match for the Ferrari round here and I was driving at the absolute limit to stay ahead.” “I could tell from watching him through the corners that he was at 100%,” confirmed Griffin. By Lap 18 the gap was down to just three-tenths and Griffin tried a move for the lead at Les Combes. He admitted that it was perhaps a tad aggressive (but clean), but with his tyres fading he knew that he probably wouldn’t have many more chances. The Ferrari got its nose ahead, but ran wide and allowed the Porsche to reclaim the lead; the chase continued. A short while earlier the Rosso Verde Ferrari was confirmed to have committed a pit-stop infringement and was awarded a three-second stop/go penalty. Allan Simonsen served the penalty soon after, but his stop-time on this occasion was just 27s – surely much too quick? Indeed so; the stewards immediately brought him back in again for a drive-through, which the Dane completed at a relatively sedate – and legal – 30 seconds. Any hope of a decent points-haul was now long gone. As the fight for the lead continued, things were happening further back in the pack. Andrew Kirkaldy had lost fourth in the McLaren to Tim Bridgman’s #2 Porsche on Lap 14, but then suffered a huge sideways slide at the Bus Stop a lap later; whether contact was a factor was unclear. The effect was to drop the MP4-12C to 19th, although it would recover to 12th by the end. The tyres on Bridgman’s car deteriorated badly in the closing stages and he lost fourth to a charging Alex Mortimer, in the #11 CRS 458, on Lap 20, and fifth to Johnny Adams’ Beechdean Aston a lap later. Adams was himself being hunted by Matt Bell in the #23 Audi, and although the championship leader was unable to catch the DBRS9, he did take sixth from the #2 Porsche – its tyres now down to the canvas – on the final lap. As the minutes ticked away, Griffin found his chances slipping away as Westbrook used traffic to increase the gap to his pursuer. Glynn Geddie was trying to take advantage of the fight ahead to close the gap to the MTECH car, but was faced with the same traffic issues and stayed a couple of seconds back in third in the #10 458.  |
As the #1 Porsche crossed the line to begin the 22nd and final lap, Westbrook had rebuilt the lead to 2.8s and it was clear that this was too big a disadvantage for Griffin to overcome in just one lap; even if that lap is seven kilometres long. The English driver allowed his lead to shrink by just three tenths on that final circuit and took the chequered flag to the delight of David Ashburn and the Trackspeed team; “The Porsche isn’t really a match for a well-driven Ferrari 458, so you have to do as much as can; use your head, make a break with the traffic and that’s the only way we can compete,” said Westbrook. “It was a good race, and in the end I just had enough. Matt was eating into my lead at the end… It was tough. It’s always nice to win, and all credit to David for bringing the car into the pits in the lead.” “It was the safety car which killed us because Westie somehow managed to put a lapped car between him and me,” said Griffin. “We lost five seconds at the restart as a result and I pushed very hard to catch him, maybe hurting my tyres a little in the process. I made a good passing manoeuvre on him at Les Combes, but it was too slippery to hold it and he got me back.” Glynn Geddie finished just five seconds off the lead in third; “I’m reasonably satisfied with our performance,” he said. “It has been good to close in on the leaders Michael Guasch and Matt Bell. We had a few issues with our tyres in qualifying which hampered our performance but to secure a podium place whilst racing with a hefty weight penalty is very encouraging.” "I'm delighted to get a podium here," said Jim Geddie. "For me to hold on to Cameron's Ferrari and the Jones Mercedes was great; as was having my best race lap quicker than my qualifying time!" A dozen seconds further back was the second CRS Ferrari of Alex Mortimer and Andrew Tate; “I think we’re there now,” said Mortimer. “The car has so much race pace, it’s mega; but because we were always racing someone, we couldn’t show its true pace. I started ninth and finished fourth in my stint and am really looking forward to the next race – I’m sure we can win one!” Adam Wilcox prevailed in the #12 Ferrari after a tough duel with Piers Johnson for eighth, but the Speedworks crew were delighted to finish the race and pick up their first points of the season. In GT4 it was a lights to flag victory for the #50 Scuderia Vittoria, with David McDonald picking up from where Dan Denis had left off by managing traffic beautifully to keep his Lotus pursuers at more than arm’s length; “It’s absolutely fantastic to get the win,” said a very happy Denis. “We both used the Dutch cars to keep ahead of the other British GT4 cars and stuck on the tail of the faster cars as much as we could.” The Ginetta was still on the lead lap at the end. “We had no problems at all with the car and it was just what we needed after the disappointment of Brands Hatch.” Dan’s younger brother Ollie was at Spa, but on the other side of the armco – the budding ice hockey star shadowing photographer Mike Hoyer as part of his school course. And it was a Ginetta 1-2 as Jake Rattenbury and Josh Wakefield brought the #52 Century Motorsports G50 home into second place after a good race against the Lotuses. Leyton Clarke brought home the #49 Lotus Evora to third, while the #48 finished fourth, some 33 seconds behind its sister car after being delayed behind the Safety Car. Marcus Clutton and Peter Belshaw picked up valuable championship points for fifth in the handicapped ABG KTM X-Bow, while Peter Erceg and Chris Holmes finished the race in sixth in the Barwell Motorsport/Secure Racing Aston Martin Vantage to make it a 100% finishing record for the class. The teams now had just two hours 40 to prepare their cars for Race 2. MH | 
