British GT Championship Oulton Park

The JRM Racing Bentley of Rick Parfitt Jnr and Seb Morris and the Barwell Motorsport Lamborghini of Sam De Haan and Jonny Cocker shared the spoils as the 2019 British GT Championship season kicked off at Oulton Park.

A huge crowd packed into the Cheshire circuit bathed in warm spring sunshine, and they were treated to a pair of enthralling 60-minute GT races.

Race 1:

The RAM Racing Mercedes AMG GT of Ian Loggie led the 34 car field into Old Hall at the start of race one, with the Team Parker Racing Bentley of Ryan Ratcliffe close behind. Braking into the Hislop’s chicane on lap 2, Ratcliffe misjudged his braking point and cannoned into the side of Loggie’s Mercedes. The RAM Mercedes ended up broadside across the track in the middle of the chicane, while Ratcliffe limped on for another half a lap before retiring the car.

After the following safety car period to clear the erstwhile GT3 leaders, Rick Parfitt found himself in the lead ahead of Sam De Hann in the Barwell Lamborghini Huracan. Parfitt set about extending his lead until the GT3 pit window opened at the 25 minute mark, handing over to pro driver Seb Morris. Morris emerged from the pitstops ahead of the other Barwell Lamborghini, now driven by Phil Keen. Despite a spirited charge from Keen, he was unable to reel in the charging Bentley, and 3.6 seconds separated the pair at the flag, with Parfitt and Morris taking a popular win on their return to the series.

Behind the top two, an almighty battle was raging for the final podium place, with the Optimum Motorsport Aston Martin Vantage of Bradley Ellis heading a huge train of GT3 cars, led by Jonny Cocker in the other Barwell Lamborghini. Cocker spent the final half of the race crawling all over the back of Ellis’ Aston Martin, but was unable to find a way by. Ellis took his first British GT Podium for 11 years alongside co-driver Ollie Wilkinson.

In GT4, the podium was all McLaren affair, with the HHC Motorsport pairing of Dean MacDonald and Callum Pointon taking the win, Tolman Motorsport’s James Dorlin and Josh Smith in second and the second HHC entry of Luke Williams and Tom Jackson completing the podium.

Race 2

The pro drivers were in for the start of race 2, and Phil Keen converted pole position into an early lead at the head of the GT3 train, closely pursued by Adam Christodoulou in the Team ABBA Mercedes, race one winner Seb Morris in the JRM Bentley and Callum McLeod in the repaired RAM Racing Mercedes.

An early safety car to recover the Fox Motorsports GT4 Mercedes of Michael Broadhurst from the Cascades gravel trap punctuated the GT3 battle, and once racing resumed Keen set about building a lead ahead of the pitstops. However he was unable to pull out the seven seconds required to negate his pitstop success penalty for finishing second in race 1, and after the stops co-driver Adam Balon emerged in fourth place.

Inheriting the lead was Richard Neary in the ABBA Mercedes, ahead of Sam De Haan in the other Barwell Lamborghini and Ian Loggie in the RAM Mercedes. Adam Balon, Andrew Howard’s Beechdean Aston Martin and Rick Parfitt completed the top six as the safety car was once again deployed to recover Mark Farmer’s stranded Aston Martin.

Racing resumed with 15 frantic minutes to go, and Neary initially held off the charging De Haan. However a small mistake at Hislop’s chicane allowed the Lamborghini driver through, and De Haan went on to take his first British GT victory by two seconds. It is co-driver Jonny Cocker’s first British GT win since 2007.

Ian Loggie let a certain podium place slip away by running wide at Cascades in the closing stages, allowing Andrew Howard through the claim third place alongside Marco Sorenson for Beechdean AMR. The Aston Martin crew finished just two-tenths of a second ahead of a charging Adam Balon.

In GT4, Sebastian Priaulx made amends for a mistake in race one by taking he and co-driver Scott Maxwell’s first British GT victory, and a victory for the Multimatic Ford Mustang GT4 on its series debut. Second place went to the Balfe Motorsport McLaren 570S of Graham Johnson and Michael O’Brien, while the Invictus Racing Jaguar of Steve McCulley and Matt George took a popular third place finish.

Full results can be found here.

Words and photography by Rich Crawford.

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