Oman Racing Team has ended the second Avon Tyres British GT Championship free practice session on the top of the pile after setting a storming early lap.
Their time, set by Rory Butcher came just after the session got underway again following a red flag in the first two minutes as the VonRyan Racing McLaren 650S of Ross Wylie hit the tyres at Pouhon.
Thankfully Wylie got out unhurt, and the session could get back underway with not a lot of time lost.
It was while the track was quiet that Butcher struck, putting in a lap time of 2:21.782 – almost a second slower than the car’s time in the first session this morning.
However, the whole field seemed to be slower as teams settled on their long run programmes for the two hour race tomorrow with the #27 TF Sport Aston Martin of Andrew Jarman and Jody Fannin finishing two-tenths behind on 2:21.955.
Behind them the positions for third, fourth, fifth and sixth never seemed to settle – especially in the final 15 minutes of the race as the Team Russia By Barwell Racing with Demon Tweeks entry of Phil Keen and Jon Minshaw took progressively bigger leaps up the timings, moving from outside the top ten to sixth and then to third.
Behind Keen, the Team LNT Ginetta of Steve Tandy and Mike Simpson again showed strong pace holding fourth position after slipping to eighth at one stage. Rosso Verde finished a very strong fifth place and showed that the pairing of Hector Lester and Benny Simonsen can’t be ignored for a podium finish in the race.
Behind in sixth and seventh, were the two BMWs of Ecurie Ecosse and Triple Eight who were only a tenth or two off the cars in front.
In GT4 it was a lot quieter as the lead held by Jamie Chadwick and Ross Gunn for much of the session, with their time of 2:36.179, was overhauled by the Century Motorsport Ginetta of Alexander Schjerpen and James Birch in the final quarter of the hour long practice session.
In third place was the AMDTuning.com Porsche 911 of Jake Hill and Graham Coomes who set a great time of 2:36.408. That put them four-tenths ahead of a very solid Fox Motorsport entry which should see taking a podium as an achievable feat tomorrow.
