McCaughan signs with KMR in GB4 as Burgoyne sets day two test pace

Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography

Harry Burgoyne Jr was quickest on day two of GB4 testing at Donington Park on Thursday for KMR Sport, which confirmed it had signed Brandon McCaughan for the first two rounds.

McCaughan won last year’s shootout for the top teenagers from the BRSCC National Formula Ford 1600 championship to claim a £20,000 prize to spend on a GB4 seat.

He will make his first appearance with the team later this month during pre-event testing for the Oulton Park season opener, where he will make his race debut, and McCaughan is trying to raise funding to compete in further events beyond round two at Silverstone.

The 20-year-old started out in rallycross in Northern Ireland, and made his single-seater debut at the 2021 FFord Festival.  He has spent the last two years in FFord, coming seventh in National FF1600 in 2022 and fourth in 2023 with Oldfield Motorsport, taking three wins in his sophomore season. He ended last year by finishing eighth in the Festival and 10th in the Walter Hayes Trophy.

“Really excited, can’t wait to get out,” he told Formula Scout. “The [shooutout] was a great opportunity, just the time in the car. Hopefully I can put it to good use.

“We’ll see how it goes, there’s a lot of learning to do and because of where I stand on budget I’m only doing the first couple of rounds. I hope I can get up to speed as quickly as possible and have some good performances to help me get sponsorship for the rest of the year.”

Meanwhile in the Donington Park test, Burgoyne was the only driver to set his best lap in session one of Thursday, his 1m28.865s effort leaving him 0.149 seconds ahead of Elite Motorsport’s Alisha Palmowski, with the pair topping two sessions each. Palmowski ended the test fastest overall, with her pace-setting lap from day one not beaten.

Palmowski initially led Thursday’s first session with a 1m29.560s. The session was red flagged, and after it restarted Burgoyne posted a lap 0.013s shy of Palmowski’s Wednesday benchmark.

Burgoyne and Palmowski again traded top spot in the next session, with the latter grabbing the ascendancy at the halfway stage and remaining ahead by 0.184s with a 1m29.014s lap which she would not improve on in the afternoon.

Despite that, the Ginetta Junior graduate again led session three with a 1m29.326s, finishing 0.265s ahead of team-mate Finn Harrison, while Burgoyne was a close third.

Harrison set his best lap in the final session but was edged to first place by Burgoyne (who set a 1m29.259s), and he ended the day third overall. Arden’s Leon Wilson recorded no laptimes in session four but his best lap in session two was good enough to make him the fourth fastest driver of the day. Jack Taylor was fifth for Fortec Motorsports ahead of Brandon Templeton and Dan Hickey, the trio setting their peronal bests in session four.

Day two results