Indian racer Zaamin Jaffer enjoyed two very positive days with the Hillspeed team at Croft Circuit in North Yorkshire this week during the first official Formula Renault BARC Championship test session of 2011 - the category rookie ending the final day third fastest overall.
The Hathersage squad, winner of the Formula Renault BARC title last year with Alice Powell, is keen to mount a sustained front-running challenge once again and the pre-season has certainly started well with 20-year-old Jaffer adapting impressively to the 'slicks and wings' formula.
On Tuesday, 8th March, the Cardiff University student posted the fourth fastest time with a best lap of 1m20.749 seconds (94.73mph) which came during the final session. He improved further on Wednesday, 9th March, to shave three 10ths of a second off his time - a lap of 1m20.432 seconds (95.11mph) - to go third quickest for the day, within just half a second of the pace. Team-mate Sean Walkinshaw, son of the late Tom Walkinshaw, ran well over the course of the two days at Croft and posted his best time on Tuesday.
Improving by almost two full seconds over the course of the first day, the 17-year-old car racing rookie achieved a best time of 1m22.853 seconds (92.33mph) to finish eighth fastest. During day two the Oxfordshire teenager bounced back from an unfortunate excursion on cold tyres in the first session to finish up just a 10th of a second shy of his Tuesday best.
In the last of the day's outings he lapped in 1m22.953 seconds (92.22mph) to finish a shade outside the top 10.
Reflecting on the first official test of the year, team principal Richard Ollerenshaw said: "We had two productive days at Croft, Zaamin made very good progress and his transition from the non-aero car in Formula Ford to the aero driven Formula Renault BARC car has been impressive. There's definitely more to come from him and we're very hopeful he'll be a consistent front-runner all season.
"Prior to coming to Croft Sean had only been out for a handful of days over the winter so we're happy with the progress he's making as well, especially as over the last couple of days he didn't run new tyres at all. Unfortunately on the second morning he had a small off, which resulted in him missing the entire first session, but after that he ran well. We're pleased with his performance."
Hillspeed will be back on track next week at Silverstone in Northamptonshire - first on Thursday, 17th March, for the Ginetta Junior Championship 'Media Day' with drivers Seb Morris and Struan Moore and again on Friday, 18th March, for the Formula Renault BARC Championship equivalent.
