Richard Westbrook swept to victory in the opening round of the Porsche Carrera Cup GB at Donington Park yesterday (Sunday, 10 April). By fending off a race-long challenge from Tim Harvey, Westbrook claimed the top step of the podium and scored his second Porsche victory in a week.“If I’d made one mistake he’d have got me,” admitted Westbrook (Red Line Racing) as Harvey (Team RPM) chased him home. Damien Faulkner (Team Parker Racing) completed the podium finishers after battling ahead of team mate Jason Templeman (Team Parker Racing).From the opening lap, it was Westbrook leading Harvey, Templeman and Faulkner, although a fast-starting Nigel Rice (Red Line Racing) edged briefly ahead of Faulkner. Initially, Westbrook pulled a few yards clear as Templeman challenged Harvey. Then, by breaking the lap record three times, Harvey worked back onto Westbrook’s tail.“It was the same old story - looking in my mirrors after the first corner!” said Westbrook. However, into the second half of the race he was just able to edge away from Harvey to win by 1.3s. “That’s a good start to the Carrera Cup season,” said Westbrook, who had won the Porsche Supercup race in Bahrain seven days earlier.“It was a case of deja-vue, really,” said Harvey. “We’ll make a little set-up change for the second race,” he promised in his bid to topple Westbrook. Faulkner spent several laps working to find a way ahead of Templeman, but dived through to third under braking for the Chicane on lap 10. However, by then, Westbrook and Harvey were out of reach.Templeman slipped away in fourth, struggling for rear grip in the second half of the race, and was being caught at the finish by Dan Eagling (Porsche Cars/Team Autosport). “I was a little cautious in the early laps, but from mid-race on I was really happy with my performance,” said Eagling, who raced well to move ahead of Rice.Having lost the splitter from the front of his car on the opening lap, Rice was always going to struggle for front-end grip and was briefly edged back to seventh by Jason Young (Red Line Racing). But Rice then re-passed his team mate to claim sixth place as Emmanuel Crouvisier (Team RPM) completed the top eight.Provisional results (15 laps):1 Richard Westbrook (Red Line Racing) 17m46.470s   2 Tim Harvey (Team RPM) 17m47.807s   3 Damien Faulkner (Team Parker Racing) 17m56.688s4 Jason Templeman (Team Parker Racing) 17m57.682s5 Dan Eagling (Porsche Cars GB) 17m59.457s6 Nigel Rice (Red Line Racing) 18m05.517s   7 Jason Young (Red Line Racing) 18m05.642s   8 Emmanuel Crouvisier (Team RPM) 18m17.525s9 David Ashburn (Trackspeed) 18m24.138s   10 Stephen Shanly (Red Line Racing) 18m26.233s