Oliver Basey-Fisher won his second race of the 2013 Protyre Ginetta GT5 Challenge season in a tight fight during the first of three races at Brands Hatch’s GP circuit.
The Academy Motorsport driver converted his pole position into a race victory later on Saturday afternoon, beating Jake Giddings in a close contest up front.
The opening lap saw the field lose the returning Jason Kenny, the cycling gold medalist crashing on the run up to Westfield Bend with Gary Duckman also meeting the armco barriers.
Giddings took the race lead away from Basey-Fisher on the opening lap, setting up a great race between the two as the train of closely-packed Ginetta G40s slipstreamed each other around the Brands Hatch GP circuit.
Giddings and Basey-Fisher were never separated by more than half a second over the entirity on the 30-minute encounter, Paddock Hill Bend seeing Basey-Fisher show his nose on numerous occassions before they entered the final lap.
Basey-Fisher then made his move count on the final tour of the circuit to take the lead from the Total Control Racing man, claiming the victory by 0.218s from Giddings.
Third place was also hard-fought over, Luke Davenport the man who eventually sealed the place ahead of David Pittard, the latter recovering from a moment that dropped him to seventh place in the opening three laps.
The SV21 driver began his fightback and recovered through to fourth place by the end of the race, passing Brad Bailey and Will Burns in the second half of the race.
The pair of Davenport and Pittard were later excluded from the race however for exceeding their allocated number of tyre sets, meaning that Bailey moved up to third place as a result.
Fourth went the way of Bailey’s title rival Burns, Clive Richards joining the top five ahead of Reflex Racing‘s Stephane Romecki, while series newcomer Chrissy Palmer was on fine form, recovering from lost ground on the opening lap to fight from 12th back to seventh for Blendini Motorsport.
The top 10 was rounded out by Ben Hyland, Callum Pointon and Tor McIlroy, while Stuart Pearson claimed the G20 class spoils once again as he closed in on the class title.
