COCKER ANGRY BY PENALTY DECISION
Barwell driver unimpressed with stewards at British GT finale
British GT runner-up Jonny Cocker was left fuming after the stewards’ decision to penalise Dennis Lind’s move on Jonny Adam swung the championship in favour of the TF Sport Aston Martin.
Barwell Motorsport pair Cocker and Sam De Haan had crossed the line as provisional champions by half a point after Lind punted Adam wide at the Old Hairpin with four minutes to go, causing him to lose places to Lamborghini stablemates Cocker and Lind.
But WPI Motorsport driver
Lind was subsequently hit with a five-second penalty, which dropped him 0.037s behind Adam and Graham Davidson. WPI appealed the decision, but this was dismissed.
While Lind declined to comment when approached by Motorsport News, Cocker voiced his discontent with the ruling.
“I think if that would have been another car, that wasn’t a Lamborghini, with that exact same incident, then it wouldn’t have even been looked at,”
Cocker told MN.
“Because it’s got championship connotations, that’s why they’re looking at it. The stewards have got a job which is to look at an incident on its own merit with no outside influences coming in and they’ve made a big decision to take a championship away from us.”
Cocker claimed that the GT4 traffic approaching the Old Hairpin was the key factor in his pass on Adam, rather than the contact.
“All I saw was both of them get checked up by the GT4 and I took advantage of that,” he said.
“My pass was not a result of the contact, in my opinion.
“A lot of people will probably disagree, but I think anybody who knows anything about racing will look at that incident and say it’s not a clear-cut decision. The fact that the penalty has been given within a tenth of a second of just enough to reverse the result of the championship says it all for me.”
Speaking to television crews before the result was overturned, Adam described Lamborghini factory driver Lind’s move as “unacceptable”.
“I want to fight for a championship, I want to fight fairly and Jonny did that, but when Dennis got involved it was just obvious what the gameplan was,” Adam said. “We’re a single Aston out there against two Lamborghinis, one was in the championship and was respectful, the other not so much. No championship should be won or lost like that.”
Adam later told MN that he had been lucky to finish, as the diffuser was pushing the wheelarch lining into the tyre, which left him unable to retaliate against Lind and forced to limp home.