British GT: Spa-Francorchamps round-up, 2022
Updated: Jul 27, 2022
The annual trip across the channel was victorious for both Fox Motorsport and R Racing as they claimed GT3 and GT4 honours respectively. The race result though is provisional due to Fox Motorsport racing under appeal.
GT3
Racing under appeal (Fox Motorsport and Paddock Motorsport were both disqualified from qualifying but have raised an appeal against this), Fox Motorsport lined their McLaren alongside the Barwell Motorsport pole position Lamborghini. As the lights went out and the pack heading for La Source, Adam Balon maintained the advantage. James Cottingham got ahead of Nick Halstead and into P2 as they exited and onto the run towards Eau Rouge.
Now back in P3 Halstead was involved in a great battle with Graham Davidson (Paddock Motorsport), Morgan Tilbrook (Enduro Motorsport) and Alex Malykhin (Redline Racing). As they were all fighting, the order kept changing and Stanley somehow managed to find himself down in P5.
His fightback was helped when Davidson and Tilbrook made contact at the Bus Stop which resulted in the McLaren of Tilbrook stuck on the track. With the field successfully past the stricken McLaren, Tilbrook managed to get it back pointing in the right direction. For his part in this, Davidson was handed a stop-go which he served shortly after taking the lead.
Back out front, Cottingham finally found his way past Balon and Halstead made his move on the Lamborghini not long after. Halstead got his head down to chase the 2 Seas' Mercedes-AMG and made his move as they went down Eau Rouge and completed it at Raidillon.
By the time the pit-stop window opened Halstead had built up a 6s lead over the chasing Mercedes-AMG. With Jamie Stanley now at the wheel he managed to maintain the gap, even though it fluctuated with traffic, until the flag to claim the win with Lewis Williamson doing his best to chase the McLaren down.
The result is provisional until the hearing is heard at the National Court. The International Sporting Code specifies that no competitor or driver can take part in prize-giving or podium celebrations and is why no drivers from Fox Motorsport were present during the post race celebrations.
With Success Penalties to be served for Barwell Motorsport and Redline Racing, it was RAM Racing's Ian Loggie who benefited. Leading the championship, Loggie drove a canny race, keeping out of trouble and taking no risks knowing that those in front would be serving longer stops. When Jules Gounon took over he set fastest lap on his way to a solid P3.
GT4
Starting from pole, Marco Signoretti and Academy Motorsport dropped back to P6 during the first lap. Leading was Richard Williams in the Stellar Motorsport Audi but that soon taken away by a fast starting Jordan Collard who was already up to P2 on that opening lap. Collard was soon into the lead next time.
Behind Collard was a stream of GT4 cars all trying to get the better of the Toyota, but leading that chasing pack was Josh Miller in the R Racing Aston Martin, followed by Signoretti and Will Orton.
When the pit window opened, Williams stopped first to hand duties over to Sennan Fielding. The rest of the top four all pitted one lap later. With Success Penalties for Academy Motorsport Matt Cowley rejoined down in P8 while Seb Hopkins was now running in P3, Jamie Day P2 and Tom Edgar enjoying the lead.
Fielding though was running quickly and soon past Hopkins and Day into P2 but a 10s stop-go penalty for a pitstop safety issue put paid to a victory.
Day was then hounding Edgar for the lead and finally find a way past with 28 minutes of the race left to run. Hopkins was next up for trying to get his way past the defensive Toyota. As the pair were fighting each other, Bobby Trundley in the Team BRIT McLaren was able to close in on them.
Starting back in P12, Team BRIT were able to capitalise on the their shorter minimum pitstop time, plus benefit from others Success Penalties which enabled Trundley to emerge P5.
With less than 10 mins let of the 2 hours, Edgar, Hopkins and Trundley were all running as one. Hopkins managed to find his way past Edgar and into P2 and Trundley pounced and claimed that last podium step.
The next race is at Brands Hatch on 10 / 11 September.
