SUPERB SECOND COMPLETES 2016 BRITISH GT SEASON
Matty signed off the 2016 British GT season with a fine second place at Donington Park, after overcoming braking issues that ended hopes of securing his and Macmillian Racing’s maiden series win.
The fourth podium finish of the season, It capped another strong weekend for the 20 year old, who alongside team mate Jack Mitchell had their Aston Martin Vantage at the sharp end of the timesheets throughout practice and qualifying at the Derbyshire track..
Starting from fourth on the GT4 grid, with Mitchell behind the wheel, the race got off to an excellent start, with the championship contending Beechdean Aston Martin of Jack Bartholomew and Optimum Motorsport Ginetta of Graham Johnson passed at the start on the run down to the first corner.
With the field tightly packed, the opening laps were spent defending from the attentions of third placed Graham Johnson in his championship contending Ginetta, before the deployment of the safety car to cover the recovery of a first lap crash in the higher GT3 category neutralised the race and eased the pressure.
For the rest of his stint, Mitchell’s main focus was defending his second place from the car behind, as GT4 leader Sandy Mitchell made full use of his powerful Mclaren to open up a sizeable lead which grew up to 11 seconds.
After successful resisting the attentions of two separate Ginetta’s, Mitchell handed the number 42 car over to Matty half way through the two hour race still in second and with a reduced deficit of 4.7 seconds to the leader.
Thanks to third placed Johnson carrying a success time penalty following his podium finish at the previous round, Matty had a lead of over 20 seconds as he retook to the track, meaning he could focus solely on his pursuit of the race leader.
It was however a pursuit that would come to a premature halt, as brake problems compromised the man from Stamfordham’s ability to push.
The first indication came on re-joining the track, as the car went wide into the first corner and allowing the Mclaren to extend its advantage.
Recovering quickly and with the car responding, the gap was quickly reduced to 3.9 seconds with well over 50 minutes of the race remaining.
It would however be as close as Matty would get to the race leader, with the brake issues returning as he lapped a slower GT4 entry and forcing the car to be nursed home.
In spite of the compromised braking performance, Matty was still able to lap impressively close to the times set by the race leader, and maintaining a strong gap back to the cars behind.