Photo: Jakob Ebrey Photography
Zak O’Sullivan had his Snetterton British Formula 4 race one win taken away and handed to rival Luke Browning, but responded with victory in race two.
O’Sullivan had overcome polesitter Browning to win the opening race and close to within three points of the championship leader, but a four-second penalty then demoted him back behind Browning, who had originally finished third on the road.
The penalty was for contact while passing Browning, who lost out in their tussle and finished the lap fighting for fourth place.
James Hedley originally finished the race in second place having charged forwards from ninth on the grid within three laps. But he too was penalised for an incident with Alex Connor, and was given a 15.4-second penalty that demoted him to ninth and just behind the Arden driver.
Connor and Hedley had been running close together in second and third on lap three when Connor was spun around and fell to the back of the pack.
All that meant Browning took the victory ahead of O’Sullivan, increasing his championship advantage to 20 points.
O’Sullivan started fifth on the partially reversed-grid for race two, and moved up to third on the opening lap as Casper Stevenson took the lead ahead of Roman Bilinksi.
Passing Bilinski on lap two and posting the fastest lap, O’Sullivan quickly closed on Stevenson and found a way past on lap four.
Stevenson remained with O’Sullivan however, and was only 0.133s behind as they went onto what became the penultimate lap of the race.
O’Sullivan clung on to win by 0.322s in the end, while Bilinski completed the podium.
Browning had to fend off both Abbi Pulling and Connor to finish fourth, with his championship lead over O’Sullivan now standing at seven points with four races remaining.
Results round-up
Race 1 (Revised – 11 laps)
1 Luke Browning Fortec 21m24.854s
2 Zak O’Sullivan Carlin +0.179s
3 Christian Mansell Carlin +5.480s
4 Abbi Pulling JHR +5.733s
5 Casper Stevenson Argenti +6.225s
6 Roman Bilinski Arden +10.004s
7 Frederick Lubin Arden +11.096s
8 Alex Connor Arden +12.154s
9 James Hedley JHR +12.409s
10 Reema Juffali Argenti +12.616s
FL: Connor, 1m54.328s
Race 2 (11 laps)
1 O’Sullivan 21m29.032s
2 Stevenson +0.322s
3 Bilinski +1.746s
4 Browning +4.283s
5 Pulling +4.545s
6 Connor +4.726s
7 Hedley +6.582s
8 Mansell +10.944s
9 Juffali +12.157s
10 Lubin +12.555s
FL: Bilinski, 1m55.605s
Championship standings
1 Browning 351 2 O’Sullivan 344 3 Stevenson 309 4 Hedley 228 5 Connor 227 6 Pulling 158 7 Bilinski 144 8 Mansell 128 9 Roberto Faria 99 10 Lubin 84