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| June 24, 2012 |
| British FF: Buri Completes Weekend Sweep at Brands Hatch |
 | Antti Buri was a perfect three-for-three in the British Formula Ford tripleheader at Brands Hatch
(Photo: Jakob Ebrey Motorsports Photography) |
The Dunlop MSA Formula Ford Championship of Great Britain reached the half-way mark at Brands Hatch on sunday (June 24), with Finland’s Antti Buri collecting another pair of wins to give him and the JTR team a clean sweep of the EcoBoost class at Brands and to bring his seasonal tally to eight wins from 12 races.
Buri also took home the EcoBoost EuroCup trophy from what was the first Formula Ford EuroCup meeting of the season, with 16 year-old Dutch driver Jos Kiekens securing the Duratec EuroCup trophy.
Buri’s seventh win of the season was a faultless display from the 23 year-old, who led from pole position to chequered flag and was never threatened by his pursuers - chiefly because they were busy disputing second place among themselves and handed Antti a clear run to the flag.
The three protagonists for the podium’s second step were Jamun Racing trio Luke Williams, Eric Lichtenstein and Jake Cook, who lined up on the grid in that order behind JTR’s pole man. Lichtenstein, who yesterday was unable to start after frying his clutch, endured pre-start problems again, but managed to get away cleanly behind Williams, passing Williams on the second lap on one of the Grand Prix straights.
Williams shadowed the Argentinian for eight laps, breaking his own lap record along the way, before misjudging a passing manoeuvre at Clearways and spinning off into the gravel. The prior lap, Lichtenstein had narrowed Buri’s lead to 1.8s, but after the incident with Williams lost more than half a second and, with only three laps remaining, had little hope of re-catching the Finn.
“No dramas today,” said Buri, “other than a bit of oil around the track, which made things tricky. I had a plan today that I wouldn’t look in my mirrors, and that’s what I did!”
“I had no clutch at all,” added Lichtenstein. “Yesterday I could not start, but today I managed to do it. The incident with Luke, he went inside me. It was too much, and he went off. Luckily he did not hit me.”
Cook kept a watching brief on the Lichtenstein/Williams battle, but slipped back towards the end after, he thought, deranging his suspension on a kerb. Buri was 1.4s ahead of Lichtenstein at the line and Cook a further 5s adrift.
There was a four-way battle for much of the race between the other EcoBoost men, with Enigma’s Fred Martin-Dye holding off a determined-looking Cavan Corcoran to take fourth, with Ecuadorian 16 year-old Julio Moreno sixth, still nursing a sore wrist after his Rockingham shunt of a fortnight ago. Ryan Cullen was on for at least seventh, but was forced to the pits with mechanical dramas two laps from the end.
The race provided a typically close battle among the Duratec-engined cars from the Benelux championship. Veteran Michel Florie and his Provily Racing teammate Jos Kiekens, 16, battled brilliantly in the late stages, the youngster getting the advantage on the seventh lap to take the class win. Saturday class winner Bart van Os had led initially before stopping on the seventh lap. Another Dutch 16 year-old, GEVA’s Max van Splunteren, claimed third in class.
In the British Duratec division, points leader Fabian Welter led all the way for Rendez-Vous Racing, with Fluid’s Matt Rao moving into second spot after the third-lap demise of Enigma man Olly Rae. Transatlantic commuter Abdul Ahmed was third for Don Hardman Racing after a brief period ahead of Rao. Completing the field were George Blundell (Enigma) and James Hammond (Race Car Consultants), the latter surviving a lurid last-corner moment.
Buri extended his winning streak to six in a row in dominant fashion after controlling the final outing at Brands Hatch, snatching EuroCup glory in the process. He got a great start when the lights went out to spring into the lead into Paddock Hill Bend for the first time, and looked in control from then on.
Lichtenstein was his closest rival and managed to match the Finn’s pace during the early stages until Buri got the hammer down.
“We’ve been struggling with tyre wear during the later stages of the races, so I was just maintaining a pace,” said Buri. “I was looking after the fronts particularly as they were wearing badly but I had much better grip during the middle stages.”
It showed, too. Buri managed to gap Lichtenstein by a tenth a lap to extend his advantage to over two seconds before his JTR Mygale began to suffer the dreaded understeer.
“I think I pushed too hard and I couldn’t get the front turned in,” he said. “I looked in my mirrors and suddenly Eric was right there.”
Lichtenstein chewed into Buri’s lead by seven tenths on the final lap alone, but it was too late and he trailed the winner by 0.7s at the flag.
“My car is great when we can finish the race,” he said. “We’ve had so many reliability problems recently with silly little things that it’s nice to show our true pace for once. We’re still not there with JTR, but we will be once we solve the problems.”
Behind the leading two the battle of the race unfolded for third. Cook occupied the place early on ahead of Martin-Dye, Moreno and Williams. Williams got a great getaway, having started a disappointing 13th after completing only six laps during qualifying due to mechanical issues. He vaulted past the Duratec runners off the line and was soon chasing Moreno.
He got things wrong into Paddock on lap three, running wide through the gravel, but rejoining still on the tail of his rival. He dispatched Moreno a lap later and latched on to Martin-Dye. The fight allowed Corcoran to close in and the three ran together into Paddock on lap eight when the main flashpoint occurred. Williams got a good run on Martin-Dye but misjudged his drafting distance and dislodged his nosecone on the Enigma car’s gearbox. To avoid more damage Williams jinked left, but Corcoran was already there, eyeing a move around the outside of the corner.
Corcoran caught Williams’s left-rear Dunlop and his car was catapulted into the air, skipping across the gravel before clouting the tyres hard. Fortunately Corcoran emerged unscathed.
Things were not yet over. Williams lined up a move on Martin-Dye into Westfield, but Martin-Dye tried to turn in, the two clashed and both hit the gravel. Williams kept his foot in and emerged in fifth, but it was game over for Martin-Dye.
Moreno, now a safe fourth, was on the cusp of scoring his fist podium, and his dream came true when Cook ran off the road into Sheene Curve and dropped behind. He recovered to pressure Moreno, but spun on the exit of Druids to end his challenge.
“It was such a tough race,” said Moreno. “There were cars and battles everywhere. It’s my first podium and boy was I made to work for it. Hopefully we can move forward from here.”
The battle for the Duratec honours was even more closely fought. The Dutch contingent of Florie, Kiekens, van Os, and van Splunteren were inseparable all race. Florie led for the opening lap, before Kiekens established himself at the head of the group.
Kiekens used the clean air to pull an early gap on his rivals, but van Os wasn’t to be denied and used a strong draft up Hawthorn Hill to jink into the lead at the apex of the next corner, but Kiekens and van Splunteren were constant shadows. Van Splunteren’s race unfolded slightly when his second gear gave up into Druids with four laps remaining and he slipped back after running through the gravel at Paddock Hill.
“The race was crazy,” said van Os after claiming the win. “Every time I looked in my mirrors there was someone either side of me. Once I got ahead I just tried to get my lines right as it’s tough to overtake around here if you put your car in the right places.”
Welter upheld British championship honours ahead of Rao, Ahmed, Halls, and Drabble. It was Welter’s eighth class win of the season, and his fourth on the trot, and it gives the young Mexican a healthy points lead as the championship takes its summer pause.
The Formula Ford EuroCup resumes on July 7-8, with races at Circuit Spa-Francorchamps in Belgium. the next rounds of the Dunlop MSA Formula Ford Championship of Great Britain are on July 28-29, at the Nürburgring in Germany
Full British FF Championship Race results available HERE |
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