Fortec's Johnathan Hoggard dominated proceedings at Brands Hatch today (Saturday), storming to his fifth victory of the season with a lights to flag triumph from pole on the Grand Prix circuit.
Hoggard kept cool after a late fightback from Douglas Motorsport's Kiern Jewiss, while championship leader Clement Novalak secured his seventh podium of the season to maintain a decent advantage at the top of the title battle.
Qualifying
Hoggard claimed a double pole position in qualifying, securing a front of the grid start for both race one and race three.
The British driver set a best time of 1m20.649s with five minutes remaining in the session to put himself over three tenths clear of Douglas Motorsport's Kiern Jewiss on the grid for race one, with championship leader Clement Novalak third, just 0.035s further back and 0.142s clear of Hillspeed's Sasakorn Chaimongkol.
On the second best times for the race three grid, Hoggard's lap of 1m20.824s was just over two tenths clear of Jewiss, with Novalak third again ahead of Douglas Motorsport's Ulysse De Pauw.
Race one
Hoggard made a great start from pole to establish an early advantage of around a second over Jewiss, while Novalak held third. Hoggard extended his lead by around half a second a lap in the early stages, and held a margin of over 2.8 seconds by the end of lap six.
That was as big as his margin got though, as Jewiss began to fight back, trimming the margin to 1.8 seconds on lap 11, and just over a second at the end of lap 13, the penultimate tour. Visibly getting closer, Jewiss' charge ultimately saw him finish just over six tenths behind Hoggard, who secured his fifth win, while Novalak secured another podium, a further 0.8 seconds behind.
Sasakorn Chaimongkol (Hillspeed), Kaylen Frederick (Carlin) and Manuel Maldonado (Fortec) completed the top-six. In the championship battle, Hoggard's win meant he closed the gap to Novalak by 11 points, with the Carlin driver holding a 44 point advantage heading into tomorrow's races.
Hoggard commented: "It was getting close towards the end but I didn't want to take too many risks. I felt the tyres starting to go off a couple of laps before the end so I thought best to relax a little bit and save the tyres for the next race. There wasn't really too much pressure from behind so it was alright in the end.
"I got a really good start and built a gap straight away on lap one. Then it was a case of just pumping in fast lap times to break away."
BRDC British F3 Championship, Brands Hatch GP, race one top-six:
1. Johnathan Hoggard, Fortec Motorsports, 14 laps
2. Kiern Jewiss, Douglas Motorsport, +0.626s
3. Clement Novalak, Carlin, +1.443s
4. Sasakorn Chaimongkol, Hillspeed, +2.914s
5. Kaylen Frederick, Carlin, +3.900s
6. Manuel Maldonado, Fortec Motorsports, +5.497s
BRDC British F3 Championship standings after race 16 of 24:
1. Clement Novalak, Carlin, 373pts
2. Johnathan Hoggard, Fortec Motorsports, 329pts
3. Ayrton Simmons, Chris Dittmann Racing, 287pts
4. Kiern Jewiss, Douglas Motorsport, 243pts
5. Manuel Maldonado, Fortec Motorsports, 240pts
6. Neil Verhagen, Double R Racing, 226pts
