Adverse weather forced the abandonment of race two from the opening weekend of the 2018 British GT Championship at a rain-soaked Oulton Park.
Having seen their chances of victory in round one slip from their grasp due to a cruel right-side puncture whilst battling for the lead, Barwell Motorsport‘s #33 Lamborghini Huracan lined up on the pole for race two in the hands of Phil Keen – eager to help forget the frustrations from a dismal season-opener.
A dramatic twist saw the Lamborghini parked alone on the front grid, with an off-track excursion for Keen’s race one rival Jonny Adam seeing the Scotsman’s #75 Optimum Motorsport Aston Martin suffer rear-left damage – heavy enough to force the race-one winner into the pit-lane as a strong weekend looked to have taken a sour turn for Adam and history-maker Flick Haigh.
Instead, a lengthy red flag period after 13 minutes circling under the safety car saw the officials take the decision to end proceedings – insisting that the heavy rainfall responsible for the experienced Adam’s incident would likely cause plenty of problems for the rest of the field at racing speeds.
The abandonment offered the fortunate Optimum a lucky reprieve, with the Wakefield-based squad at first being set to drop points had the red flags not waved to bring a premature end to an exciting event.
Scott Malvern‘s impressive qualifying performance on Saturday became nothing more than a distant memory thanks to the torrential rain in Cheshire, leaving Team Parker Racing to rue a missed opportunity at a potential win and a decent haul of points to kick-off the campaign.
The heavens opening also forced the cancellation of all the remaining races on the weekend schedule, with both the second Mini Challenge and third Ginetta GT5 Challenge races being cut from the timetable in addition to the final Northern Saloon and Sports Car Championship event.
Torrential rain brought a premature end to the Oulton Park meeting. (Credit: Jakob Ebrey Photography)
