Nathan Freke makes it five in Race One at Knockhill
Nathan Freke got his weekend off to the best possible start by winning race one of the Ginneta GT Supercup at Knockhill, his fifth win from the last nine race starts.
Edging out Tom Sharp by 0.143 seconds in qualifying to claim pole position, Freke got away well at the start to fend off the IDL driver and soaked up the pressure from the former championship leader to take another deserved win.
On lap three, the Safety Car was deployed after a multi-car tangle at Leslie’s involving Fergus Walkinshaw, Lee Pattison and Josh Fielding.
At the re-start Nathan managed to keep Tom Sharp at bay, but came under continued pressure until the end of the race.
“It went well, Tom did put a lot of pressure on me but it is difficult to overtake here”, said Freke, “I knew if I kept everything clean I could make his life hard but I did make a little mistake at Clark which did allow him to get right back onto me on one lap, but we got enough of a gap and controlled it.”
“It’s the first race, brand new tyres, so you need to try and keep the car in line. If you start burning tyres up in the first race, by the time you get to the third race of the weekend you’re really going to be in trouble. The car was absolutely faultless and I’m really pleased with another win – we’re creeping up on them in the championship.”
Behind Sharp, points leader Carl Breeze came in third to take his 12th podium of the season, which enabled him to maintain his position at the top of the driver standings.
“Third is good points and the finish moves me up to the inside of the second row for tomorrow morning’s race so I’m quite happy with that”, said Breeze, “To be fair, the three of us at the front were all running similar pace. In sector one I seemed to have more pace than them but then I lost out in sector two. We’ll make a few changes for tomorrow but it’s not been a bad day.”
Adam Morgan came in fourth, and débutant Marino Franchitti came in an impressive fifth place.
Photo Credit: Jakob Ebrey (http://www.jakobebrey.com)
Nico Aaron Ugbaja
