+ Provisional results: Snetterton, Qualifying
2 Seas Motorsport beat the heat to secure a double pole position for Sunday’s Snetterton sprints, with each of the team’s Mercedes-AMGs taking a turn out front across two breathless Qualifying sessions.
Optimum Motorsport and Mahiki Racing shared the GT4 top spots across two disrupted shootouts, with Luca Hopkinson claiming his breakthrough British GT pole position in the #17 McLaren Artura before Jack Mitchell added a fifth pole of the season for the Mahiki squad in Q2.
Charles Dawson left things late in the opening GT3 session, the points-leading #42 Mercedes-AMG coming out on top of a four-car fight with Giacomo Petrobelli’s Blackthorn Aston Martin, Alex Martin’s Barwell Lamborghini and Kevin Tse in the sister 2 Seas Mercedes-AMG as all made late improvements.
Having topped both Free Practice and Pre-Qualifying, Maximilian Götz kept up his personal streak by claiming Race 2 pole for the #18 2 Seas car, perfectly replicating his own best time in the process.
The twin GT4 sessions did not lack drama, with red flags punctuating both. Q1 proved a dream for Optimum, with Hopkinson snatching pole from the sister car of Marc Warren as the twin Arturas locked out the front row. Q2 was less successful for the team, with its cars hitting trouble – or the tyres – opening the door for Mitchell to bag another top spot for Mahiki.
GT3: Dawson and Götz top breathless shootouts
Both GT3 pole positions were decided at the very end of their respective sessions, with Dawson and Götz claiming a top spot for each side of the 2 Seas garage.
Dawson was the last car to leave the pits to commence his run in Q1, the thinking being to make the most of the peak of the tyre by running less in the warm temperatures. While he only did three laps, Dawson’s final effort was enough to move him ahead of a three-car fight between Giacomo Petrobelli’s Blackthorn Aston Martin, Alex Martin’s Barwell Lamborghini and Kevin Tse in the sister 2 Seas Mercedes-AMG amid a flurry of late improvements.
Petrobelli set the early pace, before Martin surpassed him and looked set to improve again before a snap of oversteer exiting Coram cost the Huracan time. Tse then made his move to the top before Petrobelli fought back again. But then came Dawson, catching a draft from Morgan Tillbrook’s McLaren out of Coram to deny the Aston by 0.1s.
Tse will start Race 1 from third, with Rob Collard alongside after hauling the #1 Barwell Lamborghini onto row two having fallen foul of track limits with his earlier attempt. Mark Smith impressed with fifth in the Paddock Motorsport McLaren, with Martin slipping back to sixth in the final reckoning
Simon Orange lost his best lap to track limits and will start seventh, while Tillbrook took the best out of his tyres with a spin, meaning the title-chasing #77 McLaren lines up just 10th.
Cue the driver changes for Q2, and cue another masterclass from Götz, who grabbed his second personal pole of the season as the front-engined Mercedes-AMG excelled in the heat.
After Callum Macleod (Optimum McLaren), Sven Müller (Team Parker Porsche) and Sandy Mitchell (Barwell Lamborghini) had rotated the top time, Götz put his banker lap in. Marvin Kirchhöfer then went a fraction better in the #77 McLaren before Götz responded to settle the matter, ramming the result home by matching his pole time perfectly on his final tour, just to be sure.
Kirchhöfer held second ahead of Mitchell as just 0.1s covered the top three. Marcus Clutton put the Orange Racing McLaren fourth, ahead of Dawson’s team-mate Kiern Jewiss and Jonny Adam in the Blackthorn Aston.
GT4: Optimum’s joy and despair opens the door for Mahiki
GT4 qualifying proved a fraught affair, summarised by the fact the car that scored pole in race one ended the second session in the tyres, and the one that topped Q2 had endured a wild rallycross moment earlier.
Hopkinson recovered from a track limits setback to secure his first pole position in the #17 Optimum McLaren in dominant fashion, but then could only watch the Artura crawl to a halt in the second session after it endured a heavy impact with Harry George aboard.
Mitchell took full advantage, getting his best lap in right before the red flags flew to recover the stricken McLaren to hand the Mahiki team its fifth pole in six races.
Hopkinson proved unstoppable in the first session. While Marc Warren led the early stages in the sister Optimum Artura, Hopkinson first went onto provisional pole mid-session before having his lap scrubbed for track limits. He made no mistake with his second effort, pulling 0.7s clear thanks to mighty first and final sectors.
Warren held off pressure from Josh Miller’s Mahiki Ginetta to secure second. Miller was on for improvement before he got things wrong in traffic entering Coram and drifted spectacularly across the dry grass. The two Century BMWs were fourth and fifth, with Branden Templeton ahead of Ravi Ramyead, while Steven Lake beat a spin to put the #69 Mahiki Ginetta sixth. Red flags cut the session a few minutes short after an accident for Jon Currie, whose Team Parker Mercedes-AMG smacked the barriers coming out of Williams.
While Miller ended his Qualifying in wild style, team-mate Mitchell did the opposite, timing his best run perfectly to go top right before a mid-session stoppage essentially froze the result.
Jack Brown and Charlie Robertson contested the top time early on before Mitchell joined the party just before the Race 1 pole-sitting McLaren crawled to a halt with heavy front-end damage after smacking the Hamilton tyre stack. That brought out the reds and left just over three minutes on the clock for the restart. However, with the tyres cooling during the long cleanup improvements would prove impossible for most, securing Mitchell’s pole.
Robertson will line-up second, ahead of Brown, who was set to improve before the stoppage until oversteer spat him off at Coram. Joe Wheeler was fourth for Mahiki, with George initially fifth, however the car will start last after the accident.
