With a long and hard fought season in the Ginetta G50 Class coming to a close, Tom Ingram superbly took the G50 title in Brands Hatch with one event to spare.

After racing to the Ginetta Junior title in 2010, Ingram graduated to the G50 Cup class of the Ginetta GT Supercup this year and has been dominant from the start.

Battling with Aaron Williamson in the last of the weekend’s races at Brands, Ingram knew second place was enough to claim the championship, his second in two years.

“It’s absolutely phenomenal, I’m lost for words”, said Ingram, “It’s fantastic to win the championship. This isn’t only me, there are so many people behind the scenes I have to thank for making this year happen. It’s a huge team effort, massive thanks to Plans Motorsport and to all my family.

“All of us have given up so much to win this championship, we’ve been living off 12p supermarket meals for the past four months just so we can go racing. It’s such a family effort and such a team effort, it’s great everything has come together a round early – we’re going to celebrate now!” 

With the title being decided at Brands Hatch, the fight for runner’s up spot spilled over to Silverstone, with Jody Fannin the only driver with the realistic chance of overhauling Aaron Williamson in the championship.

Newly crowned Champion Tom Ingram decided to sit out the Silverstone Weekend, making the fight for second a very intense one.

Silverstone:  

In the first race of the weekend Jake Hill took the victory with Andrew Richardson coming second, but the race was overshadowed by a massive collision between Aaron Williamson and Louise Richardson.

On the opening lap Louise was forced onto the grass by the G55 of Jamie Orton as the field headed into the left-hand kink prior to Becketts. Once on the grass, Louise was powerless to stop her car from getting sideways and having come back onto the circuit in the middle of the pack, she was then collected by the car of fellow G50 runner Aaron Williamson.

Heavy contact with the driver’s door caused extensive damage to Louise’s car and left her trapped in her seat, with rescue crews attending the incident to help her from the wreckage. After a visit to the circuit medical centre, Louise was transferred to hospital for checks, but luckily escaped with nothing more than a bruised leg.

“I got alongside the G55 on the run to Becketts but just as we came up the little left-hand kink before the corner and entered the braking zone, he squeezed me onto the grass,” she said. “I’m not sure he realised I was there. When I braked, the car got sideways and when I came back onto the circuit, I hit Jake Rattenbury and that turned my car round right in front of Aaron; he just had nowhere to go.

“Unfortunately he hit my car in just the wrong place and I ended up being trapped in my seat. I’ve got to thank the people that got me out for doing a fantastic job as they helped to keep me calm and made sure I was in as little pain as possible – I’m really grateful for their help.

“I’ve had a lot of bad luck this season and got caught up in incidents that weren’t my fault, but I’ve also shown I have the pace to run at the front and have finished on the podium. I have to thank the boys in the team for the work they’ve done on the car over the season as it improved a lot over the course of the year.”

The crash resulted in retirement for them both, but with Jody Fannin finishing last it was looking pretty slim for Fannin to take the runner’s up spot.

In race two Jake Hill was peerless again and took the victory in the final race of the season, Andrew Richardson gave the family run team something to smile about after finishing in second place.

Aaron Williamson came through in fourth and did enough to secure the runner’s up spot in the inaugural Michelin Ginetta GT Supercup G5o Class. Jody Fannin unfortunately retired from the race, to end what was a difficult weekend for himself and his team.

The Michelin Ginetta GT Supercup will be back in 2012 to support the British Touring Car Championship

For full championship standings click here.

Photo Credit: Jakob Ebrey (http://www.jakobebrey.com)

Nico is our designated Ginetta GT Supercup correspondent for the 2012 season. Nico is currently studying Journalism at Solent University in Southampton, and you can contact him on nico@btcccrazy.co.uk or on twitter @UgbajaF1 .