Seb Morris continued his superb run in the 2011 Ginetta Junior Championship with victory in Round Seven of the series at his home circuit Oulton Park, making it six wins from seven for the 15 year old, extending his championship lead to 86 points.
The Hillspeed driver thoroughly dominated qualifying, taking pole position be 0.7s. The fight for second was close though, with Tom Howard outpacing George Gamble and Charlie Robertson by just 0.023 and 0.066s respectively.
A possible mechanical issue forced Howard to pit his Tollbar Racing G40 before the race start, though he was quick to start from the pitlane. This gave Morris an easier job, but a sluggish start meant he still had to hold-off Gamble into Old Hall, with Robertson third.
After a couple of laps of close racing, Morris began to break away from Gamble and was nearly a second ahead after lap three. TJ Motorsport's Gamble fell into the clutches of Robertson and Jake Giddings, the top four having broken away from the rest of the field, which was headed by Sennan Fielding.
Lap four saw Robertson make his move for second, getting by at the Hairpin, with Gamble unable to fight back, instead fending off Giddings. The FML driver made his move and got third on lap six at Knickerbrook, but Gamble fought back to regain the place on the run up Clayhill.
A dislodged bonnet for Giddings left him unable to fight back and dropped him a further place to Fielding, but he managed to hold off Max Coates and Brad Bailey, who then had a coming together at The Avenue, sending Coates hard into the barrier.
At the front, Morris was building a winning margin of almost nine seconds from 14 year old Robertson, the HHC Motorsport driver's second career podium. Gamble took third, with team-mate taking his best result of the season with fourth. Giddings maintained fifth ahead of William Foster and a recovering Bailey, with reigning Ginetta Junior Ireland Champion producing a strong drive to finish eighth from 14th on the grid. Howard finished ninth from his pitlane start, with Eric Morris completing the top ten.
Morris commented: “It was a really good race, I had a bit of a bad start – I just misjudged it – but I managed to stay ahead and from there I drove like I was on a qualifier every lap. It's fantastic to win again, especially at my local track.”
