Brands Hatch, FF1600 Championship Rounds 7, 8 & 9

7th June 2018

Really strong weekend at Brands Hatch in the Nationals 🏁🏆

Qualified 2nd, 2 Podiums and 2 Fastest Laps of the Race.

Now joint 3rd in the National Standings, with only 4 points separating me from 2nd, it is so close!

We went into Saturdays qualifying knowing we had the pace for pole position. Traffic was the common issue as always with the Indy circuit. I managed to hook a good lap even with a car on the racing line, so was very pleased to finish the session in 2nd, a tenth off pole.

Race 1, a manic race from start to finish, trying to attack and defend my position. I slipped down to fourth half way through the race, but managed to regain a position to take my first national podium of the year. Also narrowly missed out on the Fastest lap of the race by a couple of hundredths of a second.

Race 2, starting where we left off on Saturday, I spent the entire race in 3rd. Initially hanging onto the leaders and setting the fastest lap of the race. However the safety car was brought out and my restart was not good. The cars in front pulled a gap on me and I had to focus my attention to maintaining my position. Only a few laps later the safety car was brought out again, and yet again my restart was pretty terrible. Something I needed to improve, and fortunately did so in Race 3.

However I held onto my position and brought the car home with another strong podium finish.

Race 3, the partial grid reversed, we would start in 6th. I found myself swamped by the row behind going into turn 1, sandwiched between both drivers I had to back out a little to avoid an early end to the race. A few laps in and I got run off on the exit of turn 2, losing me another couple of positions. At one point I found myself in 11th. But capitalising on a few incidents in front and making a couple of good moves I managed to drive back to where I started, 6th. The final bonus was that I took the Fastest lap of the race again, on the last lap.

Really good weekend for points.

I would like to say a big thank you to Kevin, Greg my mechanic, and the whole team for a fantastic setup and solid weekend.

A massive thank you to all my friends and family who came to support on the Sunday, it was really great to have you there!! 🙏🏻

Finally to Stopwatch Hospitality for putting on a great experience for everyone who came, thoroughly enjoyed by all! Highly recommended!

Looking forward to the next National Round at Kirkistown in a couple of weeks time!