Barwell Motorsport closed out its British GT Championship season by producing a perfect weekend at Donington Park, as its twin Lamborghinis converted a front-row lockout into a dominant one-two finish.
Alex Martin and Sandy Mitchell celebrated their first victory of the season aboard the #78 Dextra Group PLC/RHM Forestry Ltd/Dama Fortuna Premium Tequila-supported car. They emerged ahead of a tight battle with Hugo Cook and Rob Collard’s Collard Group/J&S Accessories/Lady Luck Irish Whiskey-backed entry as the Barwell Huracans proved the class of the field across a race blighted by ever-changing conditions.
That result also secured Cook second place in the GT3 Drivers’ Championship, with the cars’ combined scores ensuring Barwell of second place in the GT3 Teams’ standings.
It was clear that both Barwell cars were on for a strong finish to the season from the earliest stages of the weekend, with Lamborghini Squadra Corse factory star Mitchell topping all three pre-event test sessions, and then repeating the trick to put the #78 out front in Pre-Qualifying.
However, the #1 car of Collard and Cook was never far behind, and Qualifying on Saturday only proved the potential of the two Huracans. Collard was the star of Q1, lapping 0.2s faster than anybody to annex provisional pole. It then fell to Mitchell and the #78 to take a turn out front in Q2, the Scot running 0.3s faster than the field. On combined times, Collard and Cook would start fractionally ahead, as Barwell’s cars secured their first front-row lockout since Snetterton 2024.
Despite some overnight Balance of Performance changes removing weight from the team’s rivals, Sunday’s season finale ultimately came down to a test of skill and race management as on-off rain made it far from a straightforward result.
Collard held firm into turn one as Martin filtered into second and the two Huracans began to make their break, Martin knowing the #1 would have to spend an additional 10 seconds in the pits thanks to its podium finish last time out at Brands Hatch.
While any early advantage was eroded by the race’s first safety car, Collard set about rebuilding his lead once the race went green again, stretching the gap to over five seconds as light rain began to fall. Martin fought back toward the pit window, having kept more life in his Pirellis and the two cars pitted as one at the midway point, Barwell servicing both in perfect time with Mitchell relaying Martin and rejoining a handful of seconds ahead once Collard and Cook had served their extra pit time.
Mitchell looked to have the result in the bag, but one final heavy shower with 40 minutes to go tested the team’s resolve. The call was made to weather the storm, with both cars staying out to slither round on slick tyres in increasingly difficult conditions. Despite the challenge, neither Mitchell nor Cook made a single error, Mitchell taking the flag 31 seconds clear of Cook. Such was the dominance of the Barwell cars, third place finished over 40 seconds further back.
It marked a dream finish to a challenging season for the Barwell team, and Martin and Mitchell’s victory kept up the team’s record of having each of its cars win a British GT race outright across the last two seasons. It also maintains Mitchell’s streak of being an outright race winner in each of his last four British GT seasons with Barwell.
“It’s been one of those seasons for us where the gods of racing just haven’t been on our side. We had our share of bad luck, but this result is just fantastic, made even better with the team securing a one-two. I just had to manage the gap to Rob across the first stint and I think he was struggling with tyres toward the end so I could close up for the pit stops. I never had a doubt in Sandy, he’s so good in tricky conditions. The nerves were actually focused further down because if the 2 Seas Mercedes-AMG of Kevin Tse/Maximilian Götz had dropped a place we could have stolen third in the points. It wasn’t to be, but it’s still been a brilliant weekend.”
“We’ve had a few podiums this year, but wins have been harder to come by, so this one feels great. We executed a perfect weekend, and just kept it simple. The plan was always to manage the gap to the sister car and jump ahead at the pit stop, but after that conditions became really tricky when the rain hit and we were lapping 15-17 seconds slower. Alex has really progressed this year and his speed and experience in the car is now really showing through. The one-two just caps an already great end to the season.”
“Finishing second in the championship is both brilliant, but also hurts a little bit. Perhaps it could have been a different story if we’d have had Rob all year, but I can’t be upset about a debut year with Barwell because this has been more than I ever expected. I had the championship in the back of my mind a little bit during that last stint so it was just about hanging on and surviving, and I’m just really happy for the team, they’ve all been brilliant all season.”
“This was a perfect team result. From the moment we set up on Thursday we never looked back and the car felt superb all weekend. We’ve had zero issues mechanically or with set up, and to sign off with that sort of dominance in the season finale is a great feeling to take into the winter. It’s been great racing with Hugo this year, he’s blown the doors off a lot of other drivers and truly deserves the plaudits.”
“As season finales go, it’s hard to think of a better one than that. It makes me immensely proud to see our cars finish one-two, but it’s not just the result, it’s the way they achieved it. All four drivers were superb, the engineering team didn’t put a foot wrong and to dominate in that manner, after what has been a tricky season, just feels superb. Alex and Sandy deserved a win this year, and I’m delighted for Hugo securing second in the championship. Big congratulations also to 2 Seas Motorsport on their GT3 Drivers' and Teams’ titles. They put together a great campaign and deserve it. We took the fight to them this weekend and look forward to doing it all again next season.”
