The chances of victory for the Strata 21/Neil Garner Motorsport Mosler squad disappeared with a sticking wheel nut in the 20th hour of the 2012 Britcar 24 Hours.
Though Paul White was gaining on the lead MP Motorsport BMW he was running on a left-rear tyre than had been unintentionally triple stinted after the team were unable to remove the tyre at a prior pitstop.
Having cut the lead to under 90 second White pitted and after the car was refuelled it was pushed into the garage for the work on removing the tyre to begin. The suspected problem Paul White explained was that the wheel hubs had heated up and expanded, the extact same problem that had rendered removing the front wheels a violent looking and time consuming act since the first half of the race.
Their problems allowed the MB Racing Aston Martin back into second place and MP Motorsport to take a four lap lead into the final four hours of the race.
Behind the Perfection Racing GT4 Aston Martin, still clear at the head of Class Three there was a change for the lead in Class Four, The Red Camel/Jordans.nl SEAT pitting from the class lead with a gearbox coolant lead. The stay in the garage swung a three lap advantage to the Dutch team over Brunswick Automotive to a one lap deficit in favour of the BMW squad. Team Toyota GB still hold third in class.
More names were added to the retirements, Team LNT packing up after their latest troubles and Guy Povey making official the end of his 24 Hours after an engine breathing issue.
2012 Britcar 24 Hours Standings After 18 Hours
Class One:
1 – MB Racing – West/Wall/Brown/Cripps
2 – Neil Garner Motorsport – White/Cintrano/Morcillo/Sharpe
3 – Team LNT – Tomlinson/Kimber-Smith/Dean/Simpson
Class Two:
1 –
MP Motorsport – Poole/Symons/Bardwell/Abra
2 – Optimum Motorsport – Osborne/Mowle/Fletcher/Rattenbury
3 – GT Classic – Fairbairn/Littlejohn/McLean
Class Three
1 – Perfection Racing – Spires/Jensen/Johanson/Holmgaard/Klosterman
2 – MMC Motorsport – Spencer/Cassar/Lewis/Pettit
3 – Intersport – Clarke/Gibson/Hayes/Radcliffe
Class Four
1 – Brunswick Automotive – Griffiths/Green/Kirkpatrick/Forsbrey
2 – Red Camel.nl – Breukers/Thijssen/de Heus
3 – Team Toyota GB – Hodgetts/Hodgetts/Primrose/Meaden
