A GRAND WEEKEND FOR GINETTA G-FEST AT ANGLESEY
Ginetta Cars and the BRSCC took over the picturesque Anglesey circuit in Wales for two days of dedicated racing in this year’s edition of the Ginetta G-Fest, the weekend dedicated to the manufacturers’ trio of championship providing the perfect proving ground for the GT stars of the future.
Ethan Jeff-Hall’s quest to dominate the weekend’s quartet of Ginetta Junior Championship races and started off well with a lights to flag win from pole in the wet conditions of race one. He charged away in the early stages while his pursuers struggled in the adverse weather to keep up. Henry Joslyn had been his main pursuer, but he had to come back from a grassy moment at The Banking to eventually collect third place, while Jeff-Hall took his first win of the weekend ahead of teammate Marcus Saeter in second. The track was no better for race two later on Saturday, with Jeff-Hall initially pulling away but eventually being reeled in by Saeter who found a way through to collect his second win of the season. Jeff-Hall settled for second and Joslyn captured another podium with third again.
Sunday provided brighter and drier conditions gave a much better opportunity for Jeff-Hall to dominate from the outset of race three, with his R Racing comrades Saeter and Chase Fernandez swapping places behind him over second place a number of times. Eventually caught by Archie Clark and James Shotton, it was Shotton that pulled off a superb slingshot move to pass both and pick up his first Ginetta Junior podium finish. Jeff-Hall took win number 2 ahead with Saeter once again picking up P2. A hat-trick for Jeff-Hall was completed in the final race of the weekend, taking a large hall of points towards the championship lead. Joslyn would take second place this time ahead of Saeter and a mad scramble for fourth place back at the final corner.
In the Ginetta GT Academy, many of the front runners in the championship had very up and down fortunes, but one constant was Mike Taylor who ended up clinching all four wins. Race one saw Taylor’s main rivals Luke Shaw, James Nicholas and Harry Gamble all fall out of contention at The Banking on the opening lap, leaivng Taylor to totally command the race out in front from start to finish for win number one of the weekend. Gareth Thomas took second and Jamie Caudle picked up third, a superb result after his car required repairs for a qualifying accident. Race two on Saturday saw Taylor hounded all race by Nicholas after the latter momentarily took the lead at the start, and they remained together all the way to the flag before a photo finish between the pair. Nicholas settled for second with Thomas passing Gamble late on to also steal third.
Picking up where he left off on Sunday, Taylor’s third race saw him tagged by Nicholas at Rocket after the latter ran wide on corner exit and set off a chain reaction of several cars that eventually forced a red flag and a restart. Taylor was able to restart again from pole and again go lights to flag for his third win of the weekend ahead of Shaw and Gamble. The fourth race only secured the complete clean sweep with Taylor, rounding off his Welsh adventure with a four second winning margin from Thomas and Nicholas.
There was similar domination (mostly) from Mckenzie Douglass in the Ginetta GT Championship, as he too was the man everyone had to try and best across the quartet of encounters in Wales. In the wet of Saturday, Douglass won the first race by over seven seconds and left an exciting scrap for second between Harry Mangion and top Am driver Nick White, the duel falling in Mangion’s favour. Later in the day, it was an even more dominant lead gap for Douglass, as he won race two by more than twelve seconds ahead of White and Taylor on the outright podium.
Then on Sunday, Douglass did win race three on the road (by only three seconds when taking the flag), but a ten second penalty for a false start would push him off the podium as the Garlick brothers Luke and Conner ended up one-two on the podium in Luke’s favour. Nick White ended up being promoted to third with the penalised Douglass in fourth. Thankfully race four was a much simpler affair for the championship leader once more, with the four-peat completed ahead of White and Garlick.
Written by Scott Woodwiss
