Tom Wrigley has become only the third driver in Michelin Ginetta GT4 Supercup history to complete a clean sweep of all three race victories in a meeting with an impressive climb through the order in the reverse-grid final race.
With position five drawn out of the bag on the race two podium, Tom Hibbert was placed on pole for the race and the privateer entrant maintained his advantage into Redgate for the first time ahead of Carl Boardley and Jamie Orton.
Boardley’s stint in second didn’t last long however with Orton stealing the place heading down the Craner Curves, before Will Burns also got through at the Old Hairpin to demote the former Hot Rod World Champion to fourth ahead of Wrigley.
Orton immediately filled the mirrors of the leader, but a slide wide at Redgate on lap two was seized upon by Burns, who slotted down the inside to take second. A lap later though it was all change at the same corner, with a tap from Orton sending Burns spinning around.
Whilst the Douglas Motorsport man recovered in fifteenth, Orton dropped back to seventh, but it went from bad to worse as he tried to regain the ground, with an attempted move on Rob Gaffney at the final chicane ending with Orton spinning himself around.
All the commotion had allowed Wrigley to move up to third behind leader Hibbert and Boardley, and with his main title rivals having dropped down the order, the Rob Boston Racing ace was fired up to work his way to the front.
Diving past Boardley down the Craner Curves on lap three, Wrigley soon set about closing a 1.5 second gap to Hibbert in front and was able to successfully make his move at McLeans on lap six – going on to pull clear to a near three second victory.
A disappointing remainder of the race for Hibbert saw him slip back to fourth, with Boardley getting through on lap eight, before Ben Green dived past at McLeans in the closing stages to record his maiden Supercup podium finish.
Rob Wheldon took fifth after fending off the attentions of Callum Pointon late on, the latter having impressively worked his way ahead of Mark Davies and Gaffney in the early running – those two completing the top eight.
Reece Somerfield took ninth ahead of the recovering Orton and Burns, with Colin White continuing his impressive run in the AM class with another victory ahead of Grahame Tilley, James Guess, Chris Ingram and Fraser Robertson.
Following in the footsteps of Tom Sharp and Tom Ingram, the latter taking the last hat-trick at Croft in 2013, the triple success extends Wrigley’s championship lead to fifty points as the field heads into a seven week break before action resumes at Oulton Park on 04/05 June.
Full race results can be found here.
