BRCA Porsche Cup 2016 – Report

After the dust had settled from the GT Nationals it was time to try and enjoy some fun spirited racing. This past Sunday the BRCA had arranged a special GT12 event to show just how successful the class had become. For this they teamed up with Porsche Carrera Cup UK to create an event that would stick out from the normal RC boundaries. The BRCA Porsche Cup was created. The final piece of the puzzle was where to host it, Swift Raceway once again jumped at the request to be part of another big BRCA event.

The rules of course followed the BRCA GT12 enforcements, but with some additions to make sure that the visual look of the cars were at their best. All competitors had to run the new Porsche GT3 body shell from Kamtec with a special Carrera Cup sticker set to finish them off. With extra prizes for paired teams and a concourse for best livery, everyone had put in a lot of effort with their cars. So much so that the atmosphere was really charged up when all 50 cars were placed on the track before the driver briefing. The race format would also be different with only 3 qualifying rounds before 3 unique finals. The first would be a normal final, but leg 2 would be based on the finishing order of leg 1 while leg 3 was a reverse of the qualifying results.

Qualifying was very interesting with most of the field battling with their setups to get their cars working with the new body shell designs. It was GT National champion Adam Catchpole (Team Zen 1) who set the pace and claimed pole. His car looked a lot more settled than his previous visit during the GT Nationals. It featured some  upgrades along with new “S” foam JFT tyres. Behind him Andy Murrays (Team Schumacher) Schumacher Atom and Kieran Manders (Zen).

For the finals Catchpole was uncatchable and took a lights to flag victory in the first two legs securing the top stop of the podium. Craig Mawson and Andy Murray were the best of the rest in the first two legs. With such a strong field of racers, mixing the order for the 3rd leg was going to produce some interesting racing. Craig Nutting started from pole and lead for the opening few laps while the civil war started in the midfield. Murray and Manders suffered the most and both retired before the halfway stage. An incident on lap 7 cost Nutting the lead allowing Mark Jewitt to take control. Catchpole was on a real charge as we finally saw his Zen 1 Porsche collect some battle scars. After the midway point of the race it was Jewitt leading from Ripley and Catchpole. For the second half of the race the trio provided a excellent display of close knit racing with neither of them allowing an inch for a pass. In the last few laps of the race it was Catchpole who forced the change and moved into second. This allowed Jewitt to make enough space to hold his lead to the chequered flag and take an impressive win. Ripley completed his strong run to well–deserved 3rd place.

Top 10 result:
1st Adam Catchpole – Zen
2nd Craig Mawson – Schumacher
3rd Mark Jewitt – Zen
4th Andy Murray – Schumacher
5th Aidan Ripley – Schumacher
6th Niall Cochran – Zen
7th Louis Parker – Schumacher
8th Craig Nutting – Zen
9th Ollie Payne – Zen
10th Kieran Manders – Zen

Thanks to Stephen Baggley for the report.