> RESULT: FREE PRACTICE 2
2 Seas Motorsport continued its flying start to the Snetterton weekend by completing a clean sweep of fastest practice times thanks to Lewis Williamson who left it late before beaching himself at the top of the order, while Paddock's Moh Ritson also snatched GT4 top spot at the end of the hour.
The quickest GT3 and GT4 laps ever recorded at Snetterton also pointed towards a thrilling qualifying session later today.
The second session of the day was something of a slow burner as many teams opted to reserve tyres ahead of qualifying. Williamson did head out early to set a benchmark time for 2 Seas’ #4 Mercedes-AMG, and that time stood until the midway point when Joel Eriksson dialled-in the Century Motorsport BMW M4 he shares with Betty Chen to grab top spot.
It looked like Eriksson might hold on, until the pro drivers hopped back in for a flurry of late efforts. Williamson went fastest again inside the final 10 minutes, only to be immediately demoted by Scott Malvern in the #66 Team Parker Racing Porsche. Undeterred, the 2 Seas driver reasserted himself next time around by posting a 1m46.497s, which was 0.3s quicker than Ulysse de Pauw managed in pre-event testing and six tenths under the existing qualifying lap record.
Team Abba's Sam Neary put in a late flier to snatch second, some 0.7s behind Williamson’s best, with Malvern/Nick Jones’ Porsche in third. Will Tregurtha’s late charge brought his and Mark Sansom’s Assetto Motorsport Bentley Continental GT3 into fourth, with Eriksson/Chen ending up fifth. John Ferguson/De Pauw were sixth in the #15 RAM Racing Mercedes-AMG. The team’s championship-leading #6 had a quiet session as it saved tyres ahead of qualifying this afternoon.
A largely static GT4 session was turned on its head when a late flier from Moh Ritson secured top spot for Paddock Motorsport’s McLaren.
Jamie Day dipped into the mid 1m56s bracket early on aboard the R Racing Aston Martin he shares with Josh Miller, and the car looked odds-on to hold the fastest time when the entire top six opted to call an early end to their sessions. However, Ritson made the most of the quiet track to slot Paddock’s 570S GT4 ahead with consecutive fastest times. His second, 1m56.579s, was 0.096s quicker than Miller's best and just a hundredth under Scott Malvern’s previous GT4 benchmark.
Marco Signoretti/Matt Cowley were third quickest in the Academy Mustang, with championship leaders Richard Williams and Sennan Fielding putting their Steller Motorsport Audi R8 LMS fourth fastest. Ross Wylie/Matty Graham were fifth in the Valluga Racing Porsche 718 Cayman, with Matt Topham/Darren Turner taking sixth and leading the Pro-Am division.
Qualifying begins at 16:10 BST. Watch it live on SRO’s GT World YouTube channel.
