FIRST BLOOD TO LAMBORGHINI IN BRITISH GT
Igoe and Keen lead the line at Brands Hatch
In motorsport as in anything else, you get out what you put in. And WPI Motorsport’s decisive win in British GT’s 2021 two-hour season opener at Brands Hatch came with a definite sense of effort being rewarded. Much work has gone in to get this Lamborghini Huracan effort to its winning pitch, including in the offseason recruiting Phil Keen to drive alongside the vastly improved Michael Igoe. At Brands it all got its return.
“It couldn’t have gone any better!,” Igoe exclaimed. “We’ve built this whole team, myself and Alyn Roberts, and it’s slowly starting to pay off. There’s been a lot of work gone on behind the scenes to get where we are. It’s a real good confidence boost for the team.”
Returning champion pair Andrew Howard and Jonny Adam in a Beechdean Aston Martin Vantage, together full-time for the first time since 2015, immediately got back into old habits by taking Brands’ pole. But come the race, run initially in greasy conditions after a pre-race shower, Igoe from second had immediate designs on Howard’s lead, and after just five laps passed at Druids.
“It was a good start to the race and working out where the strengths of the Aston was against the strengths of the Lamborghini,” Igoe continued. “When I made my mind up it was just about waiting to make that move, which we did. It was [then] just a case of keep everything clean.”
The Howard/Adam Vantage didn’t relent in its pursuit, but the Lamborghini had the legs of it.
“We were really strong for the first six, seven laps,” Adam said of his stint, “and then all of a sudden the tyre pressure rose quite heavily. So I really struggled with a lot of loss of grip. But overall I would have taken a podium straight away this weekend. Andrew’s pace this weekend has been outstanding. Hopefully we can keep mounting solid results every weekend.”
Towards the end, Adam had another Huracan to think about, with Barwell’s third-placed Dennis Lind, sharing with Leo Machitski, closing swiftly. Adam prevailed by a mere 0.3 seconds. “I’d seen them coming – you can’t miss the livery!,” Adam said of his dayglo opponent. “He was super-fast, especially out the back
[the GP loop]. We just had enough. For sure the Lambo looks like it’s a good race car; definitely we’ve got a good qualifying car. We’ll do the math and see if we can improve it for Silverstone.”
Things could have been even better for third-placed Lind/Machitski but for a pitstop delay. “We normally nail it but we are human. It was a few things multiplied up,” Barwell boss Mark Lemmer said.
The main problem was that the timer on Lind’s dashboard had failed meaning the Dane sat patiently waiting for his green light signal when it was in fact time to go.
“We would have [otherwise] been in the mix for the win, 100%” Lemmer said. “Dennis is one of the best overtakers in Europe. It would have been interesting.”
It was a frustrating day generally for defending champion Barwell as its Sandy Mitchell/Adam Balon Huracan had its hopes dashed when Balon was pitched into Paddock Hill Bend’s gravel at one third’s distance by an attacking
James Cottingham in his RAM Racing Mercedes. “That was a potential second place, Sandy had excellent pace,” Lemmer added. “We haven’t had a bad round since 2019 and that for us was definitely a bad round.”
Barwell’s frustration even so will struggle to rival that of Assetto Motorsport, which in Brands’ GT4 contest looked all set to win on debut with its Pro-Am pair Charlie Robertson and Mark Sansom in the new Ginetta G56.
Three safety car periods in the opening stint played into the hands of GT4’s ProAm runners, as the Silver Cup pairings have to take an additional 26s over their pitstops and the cautions had kept ProAms within range to leapfrog them.
And in the case of the Assetto Ginetta it looked to have left them set fair to win, with factory driver Robertson leading comfortably from the Will Burns/Gus Burton Century Motorsport BMW M4, which had led before the stops. But with just six minutes left Robertson got a leftrear puncture that dropped him to fourth.
“Just coming to terms with it really,” said a sickened Robertson. “[The] car felt good, the strategy played off really well, just had to manage the gap. Just had a feeling out of Paddock Hill, felt a slight movement on the tyre.
“We’re a bit gutted, but also happy: first weekend showing real potential.
The team’s done a great job; Mark’s done a great job. From working with them all over the winter I knew that we
“We’ve built the team and it’s starting to pay off” Michael Igoe
had a good team package to challenge for some good positions.”
Burns and Burton inherited the win, and Burns had sympathy for his opponent. “Commiserations to the Assetto Ginetta, no-one likes to lose it in the last few minutes,” he said. “Century Motorsport, they’re a fantastic team and hats off to them for giving us a great car into this weekend.
“He’s amazing, Gus, I know how hard he races [from] last year,” Burns added of his 2020 Ginetta GT4 Supercup title rival Burton. “We’ve got a mutual respect; we know we’re both quick.”
For Burns too it was a successful British GT comeback. “I just felt like I had some unfinished business in here,” he said. “I was able to showcase my pace in 2018 but we just couldn’t quite get any success in Pro-Am, so we’ve done a different tactic here and gone Silver-Silver and hopefully we can keep building on the momentum.”
Century indeed completed a 1-2 at Brands with the Chris Salkeld/
Andrew Gordon-Colebrooke Pro-Am pair following its sister car home.
There were hard luck tales elsewhere too in the GT4 fight. The Will Moore/ Matt Cowley Academy Ford Mustang retired after contact with Balfe’s GT3 McLaren, the Steller Audi fell from the frontrunning mix with a 10s stop-go penalty for an unsafe pitstop release, while the Speedworks Toyota Gazoo Racing Supra retired early with suspension damage sustained in a brush with Salkeld at Hawthorns.