GT Cup Round 1 - Silverstone
17th April 2011
The opening round of the 2011 GT Cup series was run on the Arena circuit at Silverstone which was also the first race outing for Benjamin Harvey in the KTM X-Bow and Colin Broster in a Porsche 996.
Qualifying went well with the two cars finishing in 12th and 15th respectively and due to a last minute decision by the technical officials, the KTM was recategorised into a Class 2 car which meant they were P2 & 3 for the class headed only by ex-KTM pilot Tom Andrew in the Morgan Aero 8GT.
Race 1
A good start from Benjamin was lost on lap 2 when he got mixed up in traffic but he then fought back tenaciously closing the gap to the Morgan and finished the race less than a second behind.
Colin's race never really got started as a front suspension arm broke on lap 1 under braking for Vale and he did a great job to keep it out of the gravel which meant an easier and less messy trip back to the pits after the race. So a close P2 for Ben and a DNF for Colin.
Race 2
The grid for Race 2 was based on second fastest qualifying times which meant that Ben lined up on pole for Class 2 with Tom Andrew and Colin in line astern directly behind.
Ben made a very clean start to pull out a gap to his pursuers. Colin, with duly repaired suspension, took advantage of the "slower" Morgan now carrying success ballast from Race 1 and passed him immediately to set off to catch his ABG team mate. The #15 Porsche which had found it's sweet spot was flying and managed to pass the #45 X-Bow on lap four and the pair crossed the line 0.001 sec apart. From this point the 2 ABG pilots were never than a second apart and Colin had to use his vast experience to keep his young advesary at bay. This he did flawlessly and gained the class win and fastest lap as well.
So an eventful but overall good opening round for the ABG Motorsport Team.
Next round is at Oulton Park on May 14th.
Some images below showing the terrific scrap between the two ABG cars - courtesy as always of Mick Herring