John Bennett takes maiden GB3 win from pole in Silverstone opener

Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography

Rodin Carlin’s John Bennett held off points leader Joseph Loake to score a maiden GB3 victory in a very wet race one at Silverstone.

Bennett was promoted to pole ahead of Hitech GP’s Alex Dunne minutes before the start after Tymek Kucharczyk – and his Douglas Motorsport team-mate Lucas Staico – were excluded from qualifying and sent to the back of the grid for technical non-compliances with their cars.

Conditions were far worse than in the morning’s qualifying session. JHR Developments’ Loake made a great launch from fourth to move between the slow-starting Dunne and Bennett to lead into Copse, but Bennett made the better exit to regain the advantage immediately.

Loake then went off at Village but rejoined still in second ahead of team-mate Rees, who had moved ahead of Costa Toparis into third, while Dunne slipped back to fifth. Kucharczyk made up several places from 24th but then spun on the exit of Aintree and dropped to the back of the field.

Bennett held a 0.5-second advantage over Loake at the end of lap one, and survived a sideways moment on the kerb exiting Aintree to extend his lead by 0.2s on lap two.

The gap grew further to 1.6s, with Bennett later having another scare on the exit of Luffield on the penultimate lap as Loake reduced the deficit to 0.8s.

But Bennett inched away on the final tour to win by 0.907s from Loake, with Rees completing the podium a further 2.7s behind.

Dunne finished fourth after passing Toparis, who lost fifth at the chequered flag due to a five-second penalty for exceeding track limits and was demoted to eighth.

Elite Motorsport’s McKenzy Cresswell was promoted to fifth, 0.6s ahead of Carlin’s Callum Voisin, with Chris Dittmann Racing’s Zak Taylor seventh.

Arden VRD’s James Hedley was ninth ahead of JHR’s David Morales and Fortec Motorsport’s Jarrod Waberski, who was involved in a late collision under braking at Vale with Hitech’s Souta Arao, who lost control and clattered into Arden’s Nico Christodoulou – both drivers retiring as a result.

Kucharczyk recovered to finish 14th behind Arden’s Noah Ping and Fortec’s Max Esterson. Hitech’s Michael Shin and Douglas driver Shawn Rashid both spun through Maggotts and Becketts during the race, but were able to continue.

Race result (10 laps)