Andrew Gordon-Colebrooke and his Century Motorsport team made the journey to Norfolk’s Snetterton Circuit for round two of the British GT Championship and unfortunately had to soldier on through a tough weekend. The Lillingstone Dayrell-based driver came into the meeting with a lot of confidence after having made an impressive debut in the championship during the season opener at Oulton Park. The weekend started off well for Gordon-Colebrooke as he showed good pace over the course of Saturday’s two free practice sessions and both he and the team headed into qualifying with high expectations. Unfortunately, it became clear that the latest Balance of Performance regulations had put the BMW GT4s at a disadvantage and the team wasn’t able to qualify where they wanted to. The Buckinghamshire racer took the start of race one from 12th place on the GT4 grid, but sadly didn’t get to complete the first lap of the race thanks to contact with a slow-moving car at the start. The damage sustained to the front right corner of the car was too bad to continue but the Century Motorsport mechanics did a superb job to get the #43 WHIreland Wealth Management car ready for race two. Gordon-Colebrooke’s teammate Angus Fender took the start of race two but just before the team called Fender in for the mandatory pitstop and driver change, the #43 Century Motorsport BMW M4 GT4 was involved in a collision on track. Fender attempted to bring the car back the pits, but there was too much damage and the team had to retire the car before Gordon-Colebrooke could take over. The Buthlaw and Tyrrell Automotive backed driver and the rest of the Century Motorsport team are aiming to make up for a tough weekend with a strong showing in the next round at Silverstone. Andrew Gordon-Colebrooke: “After practice we were very confident heading into qualifying. It seemed like we had the pace to qualify at the sharp end of the GT4 field, but everyone else just found more speed between FP2 and qualifying. There wasn’t a chance for us to match our competitors’ pace, the BOP standards clearly haven’t helped us.” “It was a real shame to have retired from race one so soon. There was a really slow starting Mustang in front of me and when I tried to go around him, he then proceeded to come across me whilst we were partly alongside, and we made contact. My Century Motorsport mechanics did a great job to get the car ready for race two. “We couldn’t have been unluckier this weekend. In race two, Angus took evasive action to overtake an Aston Martin which came across him under braking and subsequently he got hit by a car behind.” “You have to look ahead though, and I can’t wait to go to Silverstone next month for my home round of the British GT Championship.”
Image from Jakob Ebrey Photography