Toby Sowery Takes Pole Position at Silverstone
Lanan Racing’s Toby Sowery topped qualifying for the first of three rounds at Silverstone, beating Carlin’s Enaam Ahmed and James Pull for pole position on the British Grand Prix circuit.
Sowery continued his Friday practice form into the Qualifying session and was soon lapping at a pace similar to his testing best. It didn’t take long for him to drop into the low one minute 57 second bracket, close to last year’s pole position time, set then by Thomas Randle. Despite getting close, Toby elected not to waste another set of tyres, and whilst he stayed on track to ensure his time was safe, didn’t make any further improvements.
Meanwhile a late-starting Enaam Ahmed jumped up the order mid-way through the session and would become Sowery’s closest challenger. Carlin team-mate James Pull joined him at the sharp end of the times, losing out to Ahmed almost by as much as the title leader had fallen short of the pole-sitter.
In fourth place was Rockingham winner Ben Hingeley, just seven hundredths of a second ahead of Cameron Das, who has also taken a victory this year at the Corby track.
Sixth place was claimed by Callan O’Keeffe, the South African unable to repeat his Friday testing form. He will start two places ahead of team-mate and Snetterton winner Jordan Cane, the Douglas cars sandwiching Double R’s Guilherme Samaia. The top ten was completed by Fortec pair Manuel Maldonado and Nicolai Kjaergaard.
Pole position: Toby Sowery: “Not quite as big a margin as we’ve been comfortably at, but pole’s still a very good result. I think if we put another set of new tyres on halfway through we would have [beaten last year’s pole time], but obviously it’s not just about qualifying, so we didn’t go for that option.
You don’t really know what other people’s plans are in qualifying, so we played a bit safe, went out at the start on our timing and then just see how consistent we could stay, but I know Enaam did his time right at the end as we could see our times on the pitwall coming down, so I don’t know if that’s the track advantage or if he was as quick and found something from yesterday, but it’s a positive result.
Going into a race knowing that you’ve been needing some time and then through the four test sessions can waver the drivers a bit, so hopefully that’s the case but it’s probably not going to bother them too much.”
Second: Enaam Ahmed: “I think I got the most out of that as I could. Toby has genuinely been really fast round here, so going into qualifying, especially after the pace he had in practice, I knew it would be really tough to get within two or three tenths of him and I’m happy that I got within a tenth of him in qualifying and only using one set of new tyres as well. I think me and him were the only ones to use one set of new tyres and and we just banzai-ed it in the last 15 minutes or so, so I’m happy with that and I think we’re going to have a good fight in the race because we’re as hungry as each other to win.
Now that he’s quicker than me it’s better because it shows how much quicker a driver can go round here. He’s more on the edge, he’s doing a better job than we are this weekend at the moment, especially as drivers – I don’t think there’s much in the cars at all. He’s genuinely on the edge of what he’s got I think, it gives me more incentive to push harder and I think I’m going to fight as hard as I can with him in the race, he might have the pace more than us but in early laps I’ll try and fight him as hard as I can.”
Third: James Pull: “It was a pretty good result for us, honestly Enaam and Toby are definitely the ones to beat, they’ve got a lot of experience and it’s my first time doing a weekend here, so P3 is pretty good, quite close to their time so that’s also pretty good, especially since it’s such a big track. P3 is going to be a good position for us in the race, I’ve just got to get a good start and see where we are.
Snetterton was really difficult, there’s quite a lot of high-speed corners here, so trying to follow someone is going to be quite difficult, but you could plan out from a couple of corners trying to get a good exit onto the long straight. I’m just going to give it my all, Toby and Enaam will be fighting I’m sure in front and I’ll just see what I can do, try to capitalise on that.”
The opening race of the weekend at Silverstone will take place at 3.30pm.
Qualifying 1
1st – No. 51, Toby Sowery, GBR, Lanan Racing, 1:57.146
2nd – No. 65, Enaam Ahmed, GBR, Carlin, 1:57.276
3rd – No. 15, James Pull, GBR, Carlin, 1:57.408
4th – No. 77, Ben Hingeley, GBR, Fortec Motorsports, 1:57.524
5th – No. 28, Cameron Das, USA, Carlin, 1:57.596
6th – No. 27, Callan O’Keeffe, RSA, Douglas Motorsport, 1:57.629
7th – No. 7, Guilherme Samaia, BRA, Double R Racing, 1:58.175
8th – No. 86, Jordan Cane, GBR, Douglas Motorsport, 1:58.179
9th – No. 33, Manuel Maldonado, VEN, Fortec Motorsports, 1:58.203^
10th – No. 63, Nicolai Kjaergaard, DEN, Fortec Motorsports, 1:58.551
11th – No. 55, Jamie Chadwick, GBR, Double R Racing, 1:58.582
12th – No. 21, Chase Owen, USA, Hillspeed, 1:58.830
13th – No. 4, Omar Ismail, GBR, Chris Dittmann Racing, 1:58.905
14th – No. 13, Aaron di Comberti, GBR, Lanan Racing, 1:59.079
14th – No. 8, Jeremy Wahome, KEN, Chris Dittmann Racing, 1:59.337
16th – No. 25, Nick Worm, GER, Hillspeed, 2:00.773
^ Car No 33 – 2 laps times disallowed, disrespecting track limits
Smtfhw's Travels 