Michael Epps didn’t give the rest of the field a chance to get near him as he claimed pole in the Milltek Sport Volkswagen Racing Cup by more than half a second at Silverstone.
Indeed Epps, in one of the fleet of Team HARD Golf GTIs, was the first driver to even set a time how keen he was to get out on track with an opening burst of 2:32.421.
That wouldn’t last long – about ten seconds in fact – as Howard Fuller in another Team HARD car put in a 2:25.992 to initially claim pole and show that it wasn’t going to be a one horse race. He held that for about three minutes until Epps turned the timing screens purple with session best times in the first two sectors to record a time of 2:25.016.
Phil House in the PH Motorsport Scirocco also followed the former USF2000 champion down to the low 2:25s with a time 18 thousandths slower.
A couple of minutes of calm descended on the track until Howard Fuller started off round two with a 2:24.910 to snatch back pole.
This seemed to enrage Epps, who decided to go a full second quicker than Fuller with a 2:23.913 to reclaim a pole position that he never let slip for the final eight minutes of the session. David Sutton became the only other man to break into the 2:23s setting a 2:23.730 but he was still six-tenths further back by the end.
By the time the flag finally came out to end the 23-year-old’s domination, he had lowered his time again to 2:23.121.
Elsewhere on the grid, with times still very strong even if Epps did set the track on fire with his laps, third place ended up going to Fuller who set a 2:24.458 on his last lap to start on the front row.
Fourth place went to House, with Joe McMillan a tenth behind in fifth place and Lucas Orrock three-tenths further back in sixth.
Joe Fulbrook will start in seventh place after being unable to go quicker than 2:25.334 with Aaron Mason breathing down his neck on 2:25.353.
