AS WRATHALL RETURNS TO WINNING WAYS
Dynojet’s Frank Wrathall returned to the top step of the Michelin Ginetta G50 Cup podium at the home of Scottish motorsport, Knockhill Circuit in Fife, during round 20 of the championship, Sunday, 16th August, while Nathan Freke sealed his eighth win of the season in the earlier 19th round of the campaign.
Championship leader Freke, who also took victory during Saturday’s action-packed encounter, produced a tremendous performance in tricky, wet conditions this morning but a rare mistake by the category pace-setter in round 20 opened the door for Wrathall to take his third win of the year.
Fellow title contender Carl Breeze missed out on a podium finish in the first of today’s races but he steered his Total Control Racing-run Ginetta G50 to third place in race two to take his 13th rostrum and is now 64 points behind Freke in the title chase.
Perhaps the highlight performance at Knockhill though came from TCR’s Fulvio Mussi who, having missed out on podium finishes all season, wrapped up an outstanding weekend by claiming three back-to-back top three results. In doing so, he also moved into the championship top four.
On the grid ahead of round 19, all of the competitors changed to wet-weather tyres due to the onset of rain and with the delay officials chose to reduce the race distance to 23 laps. At the start, Wrathall made a very good getaway from second on the grid but Freke maintained first place.
From sixth place IDL racer Tom Sharp scorched away from the line brilliantly to move into third but Mussi, who was third on the grid originally, dived up the inside at Scotsman to regain his place. In the meantime, Breeze slipped to fifth behind Sharp as Danish racer Joachim Ritter climbed into the top six with one of his best starts of the season.
On lap two at the hairpin, Wrathall started to pressurise Freke for first place but there was nothing he could do to get ahead of the series leader who eventually took his eighth win of the campaign on lap 23 by just over two seconds, having pulled clear of his pursuer during the last quarter of the race.
Wrathall held second place all the way to the chequered flag but towards the end he did come under intense pressure from Mussi, the latter producing outstanding pace to set the fastest lap on his way to a fine third and his second podium of the weekend.
Breeze managed to get fourth position from Sharp on the run out of the hairpin at the end of the fourth lap and although he too had to soak up a huge amount of pressure, the former championship points leader just shaded the battle over the line by a couple of 10ths of a second.
Benji Hetherington took sixth place with a fine drive to finish ahead of Chairman’s Cup victor Paul Sheard, who raced very well indeed from the back of the grid having missed qualifying on Saturday, with Julien Draper eighth for Colards Motorsport and Colin White ninth. Ritter, who had enjoyed such a good run early on, retired on lap 19 following a spin.
After the race, Freke commented: “That was tough, it was very slippery and although through the quick corners I had an advantage over Frank (Wrathall) he was faster than me in the slow ones. It’s great to get another win as this championship is very close.”
Wrathall makes most of rare Freke errorHigh winds made conditions for round 20 difficult but Wrathall kept his cool to win his third race of the campaign after grabbing the lead on lap 19 following a spin by Freke. Pushing hard with Wrathall almost glued to his tail, the Century driver got his car sideways on the kerbs at the chicane and although Wrathall went off in avoidance, he rejoined in the lead and held it to the flag.
Not only that, he also posted a brand new lap record on his way to victory with a time of 53.444 seconds (85.63mph) and with the bonus point for fastest lap Wrathall has closed to within 13 points of second placed Breeze in the championship.
“I wanted to win that race so badly”, said Wrathall at the end of the final race of the weekend, “He (Freke) pulled a bit of a gap and I tried everything I could to stay with him and attempt to find a way past. We both managed to pull out a big gap over the rest so when Nathan did make his mistake, I was able to take avoiding action and grab the lead.”
At the start, Freke led away again from pole position and he had Wrathall breathing down his neck for the majority of the race until his significant spin on the 19th tour. Mussi also kept the top two well within his sights with another cracking drive and he came through to take second following Freke’s excursion for his third back-to-back podium in as many races.
Breeze came through to third ahead of the recovering Freke with Sharp fifth, Ritter sixth and Sheard in seventh place to take his second Chairman’s Cup success of the day.
There are just two weeks to wait until the next event on the 2009 Michelin Ginetta G50 Cup calendar with rounds 21 and 22 of the season taking place at Silverstone National Circuit over the weekend 29th/30th August. In addition, the rescheduled 11th round of the campaign – which was originally due to take place at Oulton Park at the end of May – is also set to be contested at Silverstone.
Provisional 2009 Ginetta G50 Cup Championship Positions (after Rd20; Rd11 to be rescheduled):1st Nathan Freke, 558pts; 2nd Carl Breeze, 494pts; 3rd Frank Wrathall, 481pts; 4th Fulvio Mussi, 328pts; 5th Christian Dick, 325pts; 6th Tom Sharp, 298pts
