The #11 TF Sport Aston Martin of Nicki Thiim and Mark Farmer topped Saturday morning’s first free-practice session for the British GT’s annual visit to Spa-Francorchamps. The #75 Optimum Motorsport entry of Flick Haigh/Johnny Adam and the #17 TF Sport car of Derek Johnston/Marco Sorensen made it an Aston 1-2-3 in the first timed running of the weekend.
Jon Minshaw and Phil Keen were fastest non-Aston runners in the #33 Barwell Lamborghini, ahead of Remon Vos and Tom Onslow-Cole in the #30 Ram Racing Mercedes, a one-off entry for this round. Darren Turner and Andrew Howard put the #99 Beechdean Aston sixth-fastest.
In GT4, the pace was set by the three Tolman Motorsport McLarens, with the #4 Silver Cup entry of Charlie Fagg and Michael O’Brien recording a 2:32.012, ahead of the #56 David Pattison/Joe Osborne car (2:32.896) and the #5 of Jordan Albert and Lewis Proctor (2:33.524)
Next fastest was the Will Burns/Mike Newbould-driven #50 Ginetta, with a time of 2:33.898, while the Paul Vice/Matthew George Invictus Jaguar was fifth-quickest.
Aside from the usual track-limits warnings, there were no incidents of note until the session was red-flagged with around eight minutes to go following a sizeable crash for Basil Rawlinson in the #22 Invictus Jaguar.
The car made contact with the barriers heavily at the top of Radillion and was extensively damaged at the side and rear, with two wheels taken off completely. Rawlinson was extracted by the medical team and taken directly to hospital in Liege for x-rays; the session was not restarted and the #22 will take no further part in the weekend’s running.
