Zak O’Sullivan got his British F4 season back on track in fine style at Silverstone (September 25-27), adding a fifth victory of the year and two further podium finishes to his tally after three ultra-close races. After a tough weekend last time out at Thruxton, the 15-year-old finished on the podium in all three heats at the home of the British Grand Prix, with a second in the opening encounter, a win in the second and a third in the finale. The short National configuration at Silverstone often lends itself to close slipstreaming battles and it was no different this weekend, with O’Sullivan’s racecraft coming to the fore in both defence and attack.

The Carlin racer qualified third for the opening race and very nearly pipped Arden’s Alex Connor to the line at the death, finishing just 0.199 behind in damp conditions, having earlier passed Casper Stevenson (Argenti) for second.  This saw him line up third for the partially-reversed second race, which turned into an epic five-way fight for the win with Luke Browning (Fortec), James Hedley (JHR), Connor and Stevenson, which eventually saw O’Sullivan declared the winner as five cars took the chequered flag covered by less than a second. O’Sullivan then completed a podium clean sweep in the safety car-affected finale by fighting his way past Browning at Luffield, having lost the place at the start.

O’Sullivan, from Withington, near Cirencester, said: “This was a much better weekend than Thruxton and I didn’t think it was going to be our strongest track, so it is doubly satisfying. I worked hard with the team and was very pleased to be at the front. I’d been feeling quite unwell on Thursday and had considered skipping the test, but happily I was back to normal by the time Saturday came around. The first race went really well and I was very close to getting the win. In the second race I had to back out of one of the battles otherwise it could have ended in a DNF – so it was great to get the win out of it. The third race was also a positive result and it was good to get a podium in all three races. I didn’t really have the pace after the safety car, so it was good to still get on the podium.”

After a weekend off, the championship heads to Croft in North Yorkshire (October 9-11) for the seventh meeting of nine, with O’Sullivan now 33 points behind Browning in the standings. 

“I’m really not thinking of the championship – it is still much too soon. Any one of four drivers can still win it,” said O’Sullivan.