Cresswell sets blistering pace in GB3 pre-season testing at Silverstone

Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography

McKenzy Cresswell was fastest in GB3’s final two-day pre-season test on Silverstone’s Grand Prix layout, topping four out of eight sessions.

The Elite Motorsport driver’s best laptime came on day one, his 1m52.489s inside GB3’s lap record by 0.3 seconds, and was also 0.6s faster than last year’s pole time.

Rodin Motorsport’s Louis Sharp led an unrepresentative opening session on Tuesday with a 1m57.352s, fastest by two seconds over team-mate Arthur Rogeon.

Hitech GP’s Gerrard Xie immediately beat Sharp’s benchmark at the start of session two and laptimes continued to tumble from there. Cresswell moved to the top approaching the 10-minute mark with a 1m54.141s and, after his team-mate Jarrod Waberski edged ahead by 0.002s, he improved on his next lap to 1m53.816s.

Tymek Kucharczyk went quickest for Hitech with seven minutes remaining, but Cresswell responded with a 1m52.542s, a lap which would not be bettered. Waberski moved up to second late on, 0.491s slower than Cresswell, and Kurcharcyzk improved but slipped to sixth behind Rodin’s Ugo Ugochukwo, JHR Developments’ John Bennett and VRD by Arden’s Nikita Johnson.

Waberski topped session three by 0.159s with a late 1m52.957s effort, with Bennett, Ugochuwku and Sharp separated by 0.01s behind him. Cresswell set a 1m52.823s to top session four ahead of JHR’s Patrick Heuzenroeder, Waberski, Sharp and Bennett – all four setting their best laps of the day to finish in the same positions in the overall classification.

Overnight rain left the circuit slippery for Wednesday morning’s two sessions. Sharp was quickest in the first of those and Fortec Motorsports’ Edward Pearson was quickest in the second, which was heavily disrupted by two red flag stoppages.

Cresswell led most of session seven, and despite briefly being outpaced he improved in the final minutes to a 1m52.732s, finishing 0.195s ahead of Ping who was the only driver to set a personal best.

VRD ran a fourth car on Wednesday for James Hedley, who set his best lap in the final session. He lea with a 1m53.095s, before Cresswell lapped 0.3s faster to once again be fastest. Hitech’s William Macintyre and JHR’s Josh Irfan also set personal best laptimes to end the test in 10th and 12th overall.

Heuzenroeder’s day one pace left him second, 0.354s behind Cresswell, with Ping’s session seven time putting him third ahead of Waberski and Sharp, with one second separating the top 12.

Linus Granfors joined Fortec for GB4’s testing on Tuesday, and he completely dominated all four sessions to end the first day quickest. The 16-year-old brother of 2022 GB3 runner-up Joel Granfors was over 0.7s clear of Elite duo Alisha Palmowski and Finn Harrison, all three setting their best laps in session three. Brandon McCaughan completed his first test for KMR Sport, posting his best lap in session four to end 1.261s shy of the pace in fourth.

With Granfors not taking part on day two, Harrison and Harry Burgoyne Jr topped a session each in the morning’s greasy and slower conditions. Burgoyne was quickest again in session seven, 0.247s clear of Graham Brunton Racing’s Callum Baxter. Harrison led the final session with his best lap of the test to be fourth fastest overall behind Granfors, Palmowski and Burgoyne.

Test results