Jake Hill dominated proceedings to win Round 6 of the 2010 Ginetta Junior Championship around the Brands Hatch Grand Prix circuit. The Tollbar driver made it look easy, despite torrential rain making conditions treacherous, coming through to record his third win of the season on his home track.
Hill started on pole position, his sixth consecutive pole position in six races this season, with Louise Richardson joining him on the front row. TJ Motorsport's Tom Howard qualified third, with Round 5 winner Jody Fannin alongside him on row two. It was Hill who made the better getaway at the front, leading the group as they entered Paddock Hill Bend for the first time. Fannin made a good start from row two to slot into third, with Alex Austin coming from row three into third. The main drivers to lose out in the opening proceedings was Richardson, who dropped into the pack after being pushed around in the first couple of corners, and Fannin, after a mistake around the GP loop left him spinning into the gravel trap and out the race.
By the second lap, Hill had already started to pull away, clearly adapting to the conditions better than any of his rivals. Austin followed in second, with Howard being put under pressure by Ingram for third. Hill's lead was short lived though, with contact between Seb Morris, Adam Bonham and William Foster at Clark Curve forcing the safety car to be deployed. Morris and Foster were both forced to retire, though Bonham was able to continue.
Hill managed to keep Austin at bay when the race restarted, and set his sights at pulling away for the second time. He was helped later in the lap when Austin lost control of his car at Surtees, with Howard in third having to swerve in avoidance. This allowed Ingram through into second place, with reigning champion Sarah Moore slotting in behind Howard into fourth, with her brother David Moore behind in fifth and Chris Swanick holding sixth.
This was all about the change on the next lap, with first Richardson getting past Swanick into sixth. Then later around the lap, Sarah Moore made an attempt to get past Howard into third, but contact between them took Howard out of the race and dropped Moore down the pack. Fellow Eurotech driver David capitalised, moving into third place, with Richardson moving up to fourth.
After the early safety car, the race had to be run on a time limit instead of a set number of laps, meaning lap seven turned out to be the final lap. By this point, Hill had pulled off into the distance and took the flag to win by 4 seconds over Ingram in second, who maintained his lead in the championship. David Moore finished in the final podium spot, with Richardson finishing fourth. Adam Bonham rounded off the top five after Swanick retired on the final lap, with Maverick Domene and Max Coates coming an impressive sixth and seventh respectively. Austin recovered from his spin to come eighth, ahead of team mate Jake Giddings, with Sarah Moore coming home a disappointing tenth.
As the series heads to the Oulton Park Island Circuit on 5/6 June for Rounds Seven and Eight, Tom Ingram holds a 12 points advantage in the championship ahead of Jake Hill, with David Moore 11 points further back in third, himself 12 points ahead of Louise Richardson in fourth.
Photo credit: Jakob Ebrey Photography
