Home Formula 3GB3 Loake tops red-flagged GB3 qualifying at Brands Hatch

Loake tops red-flagged GB3 qualifying at Brands Hatch

by Steve Whitfield

Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography

GB3 title contenders Joseph Loake and Callum Voisin took a pole each in a shortened qualifying session on Brands Hatch’s Grand Prix layout.

JHR Developments’ Loake led the 20-minute session ahead of Voisin and McKenzy Cresswell when it was halted with four minutes remaining after Tymek Kucharczyk crashed at Stirlings.

Fortec Motorsports’ Jarrod Waberski set the first representative laptime of qualifying, a 1m21.564s, before his team-mate Max Esterson took over at the top with a 1m20.907s.

Kucharczyk was next to head the timesheet with a 1m20.064s before Voisin set a laptime within 0.3 seconds of his earlier pace-setting practice effort to lead the way from Cresswell and Alex Dunne at the halfway mark.

Loake lowered the pace to 1m19.132s with nine minutes remaining, with Voisin fractionally improving his own time to retain second ahead of Cresswell and James Hedley, while Matthew Rees moved to into fifth ahead of Dunne. 

The top six then remained unchanged over the subsequent five minutes, as John Bennett climbed to seventh ahead of Zak Taylor. 

Having slipped to 10th, Kucharczyk then went off while trying to improve, damaging the right-hand side of his car.

Officials initially planned to run the final four minutes of the session but, following a lengthy delay for barrier repairs, eventually declared it would not resume.

That gave Loake pole for race one, with Voisin on pole for race two where the order is determined by drivers’ second-best laptimes.

Loake will start alongside Voisin in the second contest, with Cresswell lining up third ahead of Rees and Hedley, while title contender Dunne will again start from sixth ahead of Costa Toparis and Taylor.

Qualifying results
Race 1 grid
1 Joseph Loake JHR Developments 1m19.132s
2 Callum Voisin Carlin +0.278s
3 McKenzy Cresswell +0.302s
4 James Hedley Arden 0.429s
5 Matthew Rees JHR Developments +0.527s
6 Alex Dunne Hitech GP +0.578s
7 John Bennett Carlin +0.789s
8 Zak Taylor Chris Dittmann Racing +0.885s
9 Costa Toparis Carlin +0.931s
10 Tymek Kucharczyk +0.932s

Race 2 grid
1 Voisin 1m19.429s
2 Loake +0.211s
3 Cresswell +0.212s
4 Rees +0.234s
5 Hedley +0.278s
6 Dunne +0.353s
7 Toparis +0.739s
8 Taylor +0.769s
9 Kucharczyk +0.819s
10 David Morales JHR Developments + 0.921s