Robertson takes comfortable win in second Junior race
Posted: April 2, 2012 Filed under: Ginetta Junior | Tags: 2012, Andrew Watson, Brands Hatch, Charlie Robertson, George Gamble, Ginetta, HHC Motorsport, Junior, Niall Murray, Ollie Chadwick, Pepe Massot, Sennan Fielding Leave a comment
HHC Motorsport’s Charlie Robertson retaliated after a race one disappointment to comfortably take victory in the weekend’s second Ginetta Junior race at Brands Hatch.
After pulling off from the lead in race one, Robertson again shared the front row with Sennan Fielding, but this time it was Robertson who started from the pole position.
Once again, he gained the edge over the JHR driver at the start of the race, Harry Woodhead lucky not to be collected after stalling further back on the grid.
As Robertson headed up to Druids, behind him there was a change for second place when race one winner Niall Murray took a tighter line and slipped up the inside at Paddock Hill bend to snatch the spot.
Now joined by George Gamble, the top four began to streak away from the pack, while rookie Tom Jackson spun his car into the gravel heading through Paddock Hill bend.
Robertson was in a class of his own, and by the halfway point had already pulled out a gap of 0.9s over Douglas Motorsport’s Murray, a lifetime in Ginetta Junior racing standards.
Behind them the battle for third was rumbling, with Gamble putting Fielding under substantial pressure, Fielding defending his line very well to avoid a repeat of the collision between the pair in race one.
Hillspeed’s Gamble looked to the outside heading into Paddock Hill bend in the closing laps, before timing a wonderful dummy to the inside to perfection and outbraked Fielding cleanly to take the final spot on the podium.
Robertson cruised home for his first win of the season almost three seconds clear of Murray, the Irishman taking the early championship lead with a win and a second place, while Gamble and Fielding rounded out the top four.
Behind Ollie Chadwick in fifth, a great scrap throughout the race for sixth was lead by Murray’s team-mate Andrew Watson. Spanish driver Pepe Massot initially put pressure on the Irishman after sneaking up the inside of William Palmer, before HHC’s Palmer squeezed back past Massot at the final corner for seventh.
Palmer then began chasing Watson and got a run on him heading into Paddock Hill, but Massot cheekily slipstreamed up behind and overtook the pair of them in one outbraking move to grab sixth place ahead of Watson.
Palmer meanwhile had a difficult last lap, Nathan Harrison and Oliver Basey-Fisher demoting him to 10th by the flag.
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