Barwell Motorsport showed impressive powers of recovery to turn around a disastrous Saturday and keep itself firmly in British GT Championship title contention at Snetterton, managing to bag another podium finish in the process.
Both the Surrey squad’s Lamborghini Huracan GT3 EVO2s endured uncharacteristic dramas on Saturday that led to them having to produce spirited fightbacks across Sunday’s races. If both sides of the garage were down, neither was out as each crew rose to the challenge.
Rob Collard and Hugo Cook boosted their title bid with a strong second place aboard the Collard Group/J&S Accessories/Dama Fortuna Premium Tequila-backed #63 in Race 1, before backing that up with a brilliant charge to fourth in the finale.
After losing much of its Qualifying to a scary accident, Alex Martin and Jarrod Waberski overcame a host of challenges in the #78 – backed by DexNET Lighting Controls/DAW/T4 Intelligent Infrastructure/Dama Fortuna – to bag points that keep themselves firmly in the title hunt. Championship leaders coming into Snetterton, a fifth and a ninth place proved effective damage limitation to keep the car in the points when it mattered most.
After strong performance during a roasting test day, Saturday began similarly with both cars mixing it at the top of the times during practice. But from there the odds began to shift.
Collard and Cook's Qualifying was hampered by an unusual wheel speed sensor failure that proved costly. Collard had managed to grab third on the grid in Q1, but the glitch struck in Q2, preventing Cook from setting a laptime and consigning the #63 to the rear of the grid for Race 2.
Worse luck befell the #78 though. Martin had just gone fifth fastest in Q1 when he ran wide out of Hamilton corner, the car bottoming out on the exit kerb and spitting him hard into the barriers. With Waberski unable to take part in Q2, both Barwell cars would start on the back row of a British GT race for the first time.
Fortunately, the #78's chassis escaped the damage and the Barwell technical crew made overnight repairs to the bodywork, floor, suspension, driveshafts, cooling and internals to get the car back in action for Sunday morning. For all the hard work, the team’s reward would be a podium and a haul of points that had looked a lost cause a day earlier.
Both cars stood their best chance in the opener, with Collard eyeing the podium from third and Martin starting fifth. Collard made a typical lightning getaway, jumping the #77 Optimum McLaren to run second and pressure the leading #90 Optimum car. However, with the Huracan lacking some outright grunt against its rivals around the three-mile lap, Collard and Cook’s chances to attack were limited, so second proved the limit.
Martin and Waberski had a more eventful run to their points with some knock-on effects of the accident still lingering. While Martin made strong early progress to rise to fourth, a spin while fighting with the Paddock McLaren set him back to 16th. His recovery was swift and impressive though, with Martin surging back to eighth thanks to a string of well-timed overtakes and consistent lap times before pitting for Waberski. The South African driver continued the forward momentum to secure a hard-earned, and crucial, haul of points in fifth. After the race the team diagnosed a steering rack issue, replacing that unit also to improve the car’s balance ahead of Race 2.
Both crews knew they would be up against it in the finale, with Cook lining up 12th and Waberski 13th. Improvements proved tough in the tight Pro driver field, with Cook leading Waberski and the two cars circulating in 10th and 11th through the opening half. It would be over to Collard and Martin to make the difference, and both drivers duly fought forward.
The additional seven seconds of pit time for the #63 from its earlier second place allowed the #78 to briefly jump ahead, but Collard found a way back through when Martin initially struggled with the brakes after accidentally knocking his ABS setting during the driver change. With the setting restored, he set about shadowing Collard as both Huracans blew up the order.
Collard pulled superb moves on the Century BMW, Paddock McLaren, Rodin Ferrari and JMH McLaren to grab a fine fourth place – a full eight up from its starting spot. Martin too excelled, rising to seventh before an unlucky clash on the final lap. Although the #78 took the flag sixth on the road, a penalty dropped it to ninth, which was at least enough for a few points.
The results mean Martin and Waberski now run second, 13.5 points off the championship leaders with two rounds remaining. The pair also still lead the Silver-Am standings by 15pts. Collard and Cook are fourth in the standings, just seven points behind their team-mates. Barwell continues to lead the GT3 Teams’ standings by 21pts from Optimum Motorsport.
“It’s been far from an easy weekend, but we came out of it with a very good haul of points all things considered. The sensor failure in Qualifying was so unlike this car, so I had no doubt it would be back to its best on Sunday after the team worked hard to fix it on Saturday night, and then it was up to us to make the most of what we had. The podium was always the aim in Race 1, but Race 2 was the real test. My aim was just for the top six so to wind up P4 was great for our championship hopes. I found gaps where I could and when I’m in that zone I could’ve driven the car all day, it felt that good. I’m really happy as we head to Donington with some momentum.”
“If you’d have offered me second and fourth after what happened on Saturday, I’d have bitten your hand off! We worked well this weekend and improved the car where we could, but it felt like we were up against it all weekend. We had the car on the ragged edge to do the lap times others could do a lot more easily, and that made the racing hard work. But we scored some really good points and move forward from here.”
“It’s been a real weekend of damage limitation for us, and the fact we come away from Snetterton still in sight of the championship is a success in itself. The team did an incredible job to keep us in the running after the accident in Qualifying, even if we were still chasing some smaller issues across the races that made the car feel quite edgy. The points were good in Race 1, it’s just a shame about the penalty in the last race. But we leave still well in the championship fight.”
“It’s been a very tough weekend and we’ve been in damage limitation mode for much of it. P5 was pretty surprising in Race 1 after everything that had happened up to that point, so we have to be happy with that and huge thanks to the team for keeping us in the game. At least we scored some points in Race 2, that’s the most important thing because it’s tough to overtake around here and the odds were always stacked against us.”
“Overall we have to be pleased with how we managed what was perhaps our most challenging British GT weekend in recent memory. To have both cars in trouble by the end of Saturday and starting at the back on Sunday is unheard of for us, but the team did an amazing job with the repairs – particularly with the #78 – and the drivers never let their heads drop when the chips were down and that’s a championship-winning mentality. The podium in Race 1 was great, but Rob and Hugo’s fight back to fourth was arguably even more impressive when we clearly didn’t have the ultimate pace. Alex and Jarrod kept calm and managed a car that was never going to be perfect very well to take two points scores and keep the championship lead in sight. We have a few weeks to refresh both cars before the next round at Donington, when we’ll be back out fighting and hoping for business as usual!”
