British GT Championship - Croft – Qualifying Report
Classy Simonsen – And Team Aero
© Mark Howson

After 30 minutes of qualifying, there was really no calling how the weekend’s races were going to pan out, so different were the results of the two sessions.

By the time the cars took to the track on a gloriously sunny afternoon, the temperature had risen markedly since the morning practice, which was a particular concern for the Team Aero Morgan.

The three RPM Vipers led the field out for the start of the first session, in an effort to have a clear lap on which to qualify. However, after five minutes it was a Porsche that led the times, as Tom Ferrier took the Tech 9 Porsche round the 2.125 mile circuit in a time of 1:25.066.

Guy Harrington soon bettered that time by three hundredths, and Nigel Redwood shaved four thousandths off Ferrier’s time to move up to second.

But it was evident that David Jones was climbing the times; up to fifth half way through the session and then dropping in a pole-setting 1:24.784 with a few minutes remaining. He was soon joined on the front row by another Ascari, as Michael Greenhalgh set a 1:24.946 in the #31 Berlanga KZ1R.

In GTC, Keith Ahlers quickly set up camp at the head of the times and pitted after five laps with a best of 1:28.006. This remained seven-tenths faster than Graeme Mundy’s best, with Andrew Howard setting third fastest.

The second session was more dramatic, for the first few laps at least, and a certain Danish driver demonstrated exactly why he is in such demand around the globe.

Bradley Ellis made a strong statement of intent by beating the race one pole time on his first flying lap, with a 1:24.713 in the #6 RPM Viper. This lead lasted two minutes before the times suddenly began to tumble.

Allan Simonsen lowered the pole time by half a second, and Adam Wilcox took second with a 1:24.467. There was barely enough time to let this sink in before Jonny Cocker posted a 1:24.293, just a tenth behind Simonsen. Meanwhile, Ellis had improved his time to 1:24.417 and retaken third from Wilcox.

With just five minutes left, Wilcox took the VRS Ferrari back up to second, but he crossed the line behind Simonsen’s Ferrari and he suddenly found himself an enormous 1.223 seconds from pole; the Dane’s time was an unbeatable 1:23.019.

Jonny Cocker came back up to second shortly afterwards, but remained a second off Simonsen’s pole time.

In GTC, Steve Hyde claimed the second pole of the day for Team Aero, a feat never before achieved by the team. Like Keith Ahlers, Hyde parked up before the end of the session in order to reduce the risk to the car. “The handling is fantastic, but we’re very marginal on the temperature,” said Ahlers. “We’re now working on tweaking the revs and other things to reduce the heat generation of the engine, and at the same time working on increasing the cooling through getting more air under the bonnet.

“The strategy will be to drive as slowly as we can while still maintaining a small gap at the front. We’re confident that the car will still have the pace to win.”

The first race is due to start at 16:15, but the signs are that the GT3 fight is as open as any race so far this season.