Sophia Floersch brought a serious amount of ‘Girl Power’ to the KICK Start Energy Ginetta Junior Championship at Thruxton this weekend (May 9/10), taking a stunning double victory on her first ever visit to the high-speed Thruxton circuit in Hampshire, and becoming the first rookie race winner of 2015.
The rookies were once again on fantastic form, as Ginetta Junior Scholarship winner Stuart Middleton claimed pole position in the Quinton Hazell (QH) backed car, leading what was an all-rookie top five ahead of race one, with Floersch, Dave Wooder, Patrik Matthiesen and Cameron Roberts taking the first five positions on the grid.
As the lights went out, Floersch stormed into the lead as the cars went through Allard for the first time, whilst Matthiesen picked off a position to move from fourth into third by the end of the opening lap and Zelos climbed from sixth to third.
The middle section of the race was spent under safety car as Brown spun under pressure from Nicosia, with the former collected by Perez, who was forced to stop on circuit. With the race restarted on lap seven, Floersch made a break from the pack as she powered over the lap, leaving Middleton to fend off Zelos, which he did successfully until the penultimate lap, when Zelos swept past.
Matthiesen remained in fourth just ahead of Wooder for most of the race, but with just a few laps left to run, the pair spun and dropped out of the top five, leaving Caroline and Monger to make the most of their misfortune.
As the race reached its conclusion, a strong drive from Floersch saw her claim the first win from a rookie driver in 2015, whilst Zelos and Middleton picked up their first outright podiums of the year in second and third respectively.
Starting from pole position for the second race of the weekend, Floersch made a textbook start once again and led the first into Allard for the first time. Whilst the top three pulled away, chaos down the pack called for a safety car, and the pack were all bunched up once again.
Making her second race restart of the weekend, Floersch repeated her race one style and held onto her lead as the cars powered away once again. Zelos, Middleton, Monger and Proctor all rounded out the top five, with Monger taking third at the Complex on lap four.
Just as things were starting to get exciting, an incident for Esmee Hawkey at Noble called for a second safety car whilst the marshals repaired the tyre wall. Quick work meant the racers could get back to full speed with three laps left to run, and Zelos pulled out all the stops on the final tours.
Waiting in the wins was Caroline, who found a route around Middleton to move into fourth, and soon caught up to the top three ahead. As Zelos tried his hardest to pass Floersch whilst keeping Monger behind, the trio found themselves in a five-way fight for the win as the race reached its climax.
Holding onto her position to the flag, Floersch took two wins from two, although Zelos lost three spots in one lap as Monger, Caroline and Middleton all climbed up the order on the final lap. On the run to the line, the foursome were almost side-by-side as they approached the chequered flag with Monger securing the runners up spot, just ahead of Caroline.
Speaking after the race, Floersch said; “It’s been an amazing weekend. To win the first race was perfect, and now we’ve managed to win again which is the best feeling ever. We’ve had good pace everywhere so far this year but we hadn’t got it together, but it did this weekend and its amazing.”
Provisional KICK Start Energy Ginetta Junior Championship Standings After Six Rounds.
1 PROCTOR, Senna 148
2 MONGER, Billy 130
3 ZELOS, Dan 120
4 FLOERSCH, Sophia 119
5 CAROLINE, Jamie 112
6 HADFIELD, Jonathan 108
7 MATTHIESEN, Patrik 103
8 BROWN, Lewis 84
9 TREGURTHA, Will 83
10 HORNBY, Kyle 81
