James Abbott has taken victory in the final race of the weekend at Croft for the Dunlop MSA Formula Ford Championship of Great Britain. The Radical Motorsport driver was never headed during the race, which was televised live, taking the lead at the start and refusing to let go despite strong opposition from race 2 winner, Ashley Sutton. A tenth of a second split the #74 Mygale from it’s Jamun Racing run rival at the flag.
At the start of the race Abbott judged the lights perfectly, leaving the pole sitting and championship leading Falcon Motorsports machine of Harrison Scott standing as he rocketed away from second on the grid. The overtake was completed by Clervaux and as the cars streamed across the line again the gap was a third of a second, the minimum gap that Abbott would hold until the final lap of the race.
Juan Rosso in the second Radical run car then stepped in, preventing Scott from giving chase with an attempt on second place. As the Falcon and Radical men dueled, Abbott made good his escape.
Round 14 winner Sutton had a slightly different start, which may have cost him the race. He got away well and passed a car into the first corner but then found himself stuck behind the JTR Motorsport machine of Jayde Kruger for four laps, the South African has had a bad weekend at Croft, which included relinquishing the lead of the championship and the final race would bring him little joy. A dive to the inside at the Hairpin put the Jamun car ahead and Sutton set to hunting down Juan Rosso now carrying front wing damage from a bump in the overtake.
The damage to the #16 Mygale didn’t seem to slow the car down any though, it took Sutton only two laps to catch and pass Rosso and move off in pursuit of Harrison Scott. The Falcon man was also struggling with damage to his Mygale and didn’t see the red rocket coming. The move was made at Sunny In on the eleventh of fifteen laps.
Over the next three laps Sutton reduced the gap from over a second and a half to under half a second. The pressure from behind prompted a lock up into the complex by James Abbott but the split was too large for Sutton to send his car up the inside.
Abbott said, “It’s fair to say I felt under a bit of pressure! I knew I could get a bit of a cushion between myself and Harrison but then I was watching my mirrors for the red car… I think both Ashley and I made mistakes on the last lap. I had a little lock-up and then I think he did also. It was all a bit too close. It feels good to have won without the benefit of a reverse-grid pole.”
Ashley Sutton added, “Another lap and I could have won it. In fact, one more corner and I could have… I just ran out of time.”
The result for the Scholarship class entered driver gives him his third class win of the weekend. Next up in the scholarship class went to Connor Mills for Meridian Motorsport who finished in seventh overall.
Scott held out from Rosso for the final podium spot, with Jayde Kruger in fifth despite a five second penalty being added to his time for violating the track limits. The JTR Motorsport driver finished ahead of his team mate Max Marshall with Mills heading Ricky Collard’s Falcon machine. Chris Mealin in the third Falcon Mygale and Connor Jupp in the second of the Meridian cars rounded out the top ten. Greg Holloway in the SWB Motorsport Sinter-Scholar bettered the sole Richardson Racing entry, Louise Richardson. Richardson was the only driver to fall off the lead lap in the race.
