BRITISH GT ROUND 3 CURTAILED BY PRACTICE PRANG

Round three of the 2017 British GT championship lasted just half a day for Matty, after a sizeable crash for team-mate Marcus Hoggarth inflicted terminal damage on the pair’s In2Racing McLaren 570S GT4 in the second practice at Rockingham Motor Speedway.

In the middle of his first run of the session, Hoggarth slammed into the wall at turn one on the oval section of the circuit’s ISSC layout, before limping to a halt at the next corner.

While the damage appeared to be mainly cosmetic at first glance, a thorough inspection by the team’s mechanics revealed a host of issues that left no option but to withdraw from the remainder of the meeting.

Having travelled to the Northamptonshire venue looking to build on a solid second place at Oulton Park over the Easter weekend, it was an unfortunate way to conclude the weekend, especially as on the evidence of Matty’s run earlier in the session, he, Marcus and the team were unlocking more latent speed.

After struggling with an under-steering car in the first one hour period of practice in the morning, drivers and mechanics combined to identify areas for improvement, with their efforts yielding an instant reward as Matty posted a time 1.2 seconds faster than his morning effort on his first flying lap.

The 1:24.198 effort was good enough for third in GT4 for much of the session, before dropping to six as others posted faster times as track conditions improved.

And while being parked up as the weekend moved into the competitive sections, Matty was able to take solace that he had again combined well with his team mate and crew to evolve the car and extract more performance over the course of the on track action.

The next round of the 2017 British GT season will see the field head to Snetterton Circuit in Norwich for a second, double header round, with races four and five taking place over the weekend of 27 & 28 May.