Around the British Championships: 15 – 16 October 2022
A blockbuster end to the British GT Championship, plus action aplenty in its supporting GB3 and GB4 categories, headline our latest round-up of British Championship action:
British GT Championship – Donington Park (GP)
A brace of second-placed finishes proved enough for RAM Racing’s Ian Loggie and Stellar Motorsport’s pairing of Richard Williams and Sennan Fielding to lift the GT3 and GT4 crowns respectively in a thrilling end to the British GT Championship at Donington Park.
The two-hour title decider more than lived up to its billing, with drama right from the get-go as Loggie and the Barwell Lamborghini of Adam Balon and Sandy Mitchell, second in the GT3 standings, both went off at Redgate in avoidance of Enduro Motorsport’s spinning McLaren.
And pre-race favourite Loggie found himself in strife just one lap later, spinning out of the final corner to leave his Mercedes-AMG anchored to the back of the field. A salvage job on-track, plus a fortuitous safety car period, brought the #6 crew back into contention, and team-mate Jules Gounon duly emerged from the stops in second.
Try as Gounon might to overhaul race leaders Century Motorsport with Alexander Sims at the wheel, he fell 0.5 seconds short, but his efforts proved enough to deliver Loggie the GT3 crown. For Century, a first GT3 victory also meant a win on debut for Sims’ team-mate Darren Leung behind the wheel of a BMW M4.
In the GT4, the race was convincingly won by Toyota Gazoo Racing’s Supra in the hands of Tom Edgar and Jordan Collard, but a superb drive from Williams and Fielding earned them the coveted crown.
The pair had trailed Matt Topham and Darren Turner’s Newbridge Motorsport-run Aston Martin by 12.5 points heading to Leicestershire, but qualifying woes put the latter on the back foot. After the first stint, Fielding emerged in fifth, with Turner ninth.
What then followed was something of a game of cat-and-mouse through the pack as both cars put on a late-race charge, but traffic ultimately hampered Turner’s progress and delivered the title to the Stellar-run Audi.
GB3 Championship – Donington Park (GP)
Luke Browning became the first driver to win both major British single seater titles in the modern era after adding the 2022 GB3 Championship title to his 2020 ROKiT British F4 success at Donington Park.
The Hitech GP racer arrived in the East Midlands with a 16.5-point buffer over Joel Granfors, the Fortec Motorsport-run Swede the only driver left with a mathematical chance of denying Browning the crown at his first full-season attempt.
Having qualified fifth and eighth respectively, both drivers made progress in the opening race, Browning second and Granfors fifth, with Carlin’s Callum Voisin the winner. That presented Cheshire-based Browning with his first opportunity to wrap things up in Sunday morning’s second of three races.
With rain overnight and a damp-but-drying surface, chances of an early celebration for Browning looked ever so slim at Redgate on the opening lap as Granfors surged from fourth on the grid to lead with a sweeping move around the outside.
But his advantage lasted just three laps as Elite Motorsport’s Tom Lebbon re-passed him, and from there Granfors continued to sink down the order. Browning, in contrast, quietly picked his way through to third on the road – second after a penalty for McKenzy Cresswell (Chris Dittmann Racing) – and that was enough to gift him the title.
With the championship wrapped up, race three went the way of Nick Gilkes, the Hillspeed driver sustaining race-long pressure from Hitech’s Cian Shields.
GB4 Championship – Donington Park (GP)
Kevin Mills Racing’s Jarrod Waberski ended the inaugural GB4 Championship season in fine fashion, scoring a brace of victories as Fortec Motorsport’s Nikolas Taylor claimed the title.
Taylor made the journey to Donington Park with a comfortable, but not insurmountable 31-point advantage over Max Marzorati, and still managed to qualify third despite pushing too hard and crashing during qualifying.
Polesitter Jack Sherwood slid into the gravel on the formation lap of race one, and Taylor duly inherited second behind eventual race winner Tom Mills, the runner-up spot moving him to within touching distance of the title, with Marzorati only seventh.
Despite a yo-yo performance, in which the Anglo-Malaysian occupied nearly every position inside the top eight, fourth at the chequered flag in race two was enough for Taylor to put the honours beyond his rivals’ reach with a round to spare.
Waberski had made his way through a chaotic opening few laps to lead, and repeated the feat after a surging drive in race three, including late passes on Fortec’s Jessica Edgar and Marzorati to complete an emphatic hat-trick for the KMR squad.