Jack Taylor leads Fortec 1-2 in GB4’s opening Silverstone race

Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography

Jack Taylor converted pole into a maiden victory ahead of his Fortec Motorsports team-mate Thomas Ingram Hill in GB4 race one at Silverstone.

There was a delay to the start after KMR Sport’s Lily Watkins stopped on the grass with an issue on the formation lap, and it took several minutes for her stricken car to be recovered.

The rest of the field eventually set off for a second formation lap, and the race’s duration was reduced slightly to 16 minutes.

Taylor gained a clear lead into Copse once the action got underway, while Arden’s Leon Wilson swept around the outside of Douglas Motorsport’s debutant Arjen Kraling for second.

Ingram Hill climbed from sixth to snatch third from Kraling, who lost further ground to Elite Motorsport’s Alex Kattoulas on the run to Maggotts.

Dayton Coulthard went side by side with his team-mate Kraling but ran wide at Becketts and slipped to ninth, as Hillspeed’s Leandro Juncos fought hard to hold off Elite duo Isaac Phelps and Ary Bansal for sixth on the opening lap.

Taylor led by a second after one lap, and he edged away by a further 0.2s on lap three. He then pulled further clear as Wilson came under pressure from Ingram Hill for second, and by race-end had a 2.96s gap.

Ingram Hill prevailed in his lap four battle with Wilson, moving up the inside at Abbey before completing the move into Village. Wilson fought back into Brooklands, but Ingram Hill used the inside line into Luffield to remain ahead. He then pulled over three seconds clear of his rival over the remaining laps.

The pair’s battle initially brought Kattoulas into contention, but he could not find a way past Wilson and missed out on a podium finish at the chequered flag by 0.4s.

Kraling was less than a second further behind in fifth, and just ahead of Juncos, Phelps and Bansal. Coulthard remained in ninth until the finish, and ADM’s Jason Pribyl completed the top 10.

Having suffered a broken gear linkage in qualifying, Hillspeed’s championship leader Daniel Guinchard made up six places to 11th early on, but was unable to make further progress.

Race results (8 laps)