Mix Up Ruins Manor’s Brands Weekend

 

Front-running CERTINA Formula Renault 2.0 UK Championship team Manor Competition rued a costly mistake during Round Eighteen at Brands Hatch, which cost Jordan King a guaranteed podium finish in a mixed weekend for the East Midlands-based team.

Qualifying saw King come out on top for the Manor team, setting the fourth fastest time, with team-mates Alice Powell and Josh Hill a frustrating twelfth and thirteenth respectively. At the start of the opener, King cut in to a fourth place, while Powell and Hill rose to tenth and eleventh between them.

While King held his place until the end, Powell and Hill were able to make progress through the field. Hill passed Powell first, before dispatching two other rivals, with Powell following through, the duo ending up eighth and ninth respectively.

Starting fourth again for the second race, teenager King made a good start and immediately got into the top three. Running competitively, King benefitted from a rival's drive-through penalty to take second, but then took to the pit lane himself, mistakenly thinking he had a drive-through himself.

King emerged to finish in a lowly twelfth, a disappointing end to a promising run. Team-mate Hill had a much better race, starting eleventh and producing a great drive through to sixth, while Powell ended the race two places back after working her way up from tenth.

Manor Competition co-owner Sarah Shaw said: “We should have had a podium with Jordan in race two, there's no doubt about that. It was a really unfortunate mistake, he thought he was the one with the drive-through so that completely ruined his race. Fourth in race one was a good result, if he'd been able to get into third off the start we're sure he'd have been on the podium.

“Josh and Alice both raced very well and made up a lot of places. Qualifying was the problem, again, and left them a lot of hard work to do. Considering where they both started each race, their results were pretty strong.”