New Rollcentre Pairing of Brown and Fisken bring home honours from Rockingham!
Rollcentre protege Dan Brown has consolidated his challenge for the Avon Tyres British GT Championship with a great weekend of racing with Gregor Fisken at Rockingham Motor Speedway.
Sharing the Momo-backed Rollcentre Mosler drive with Gregor Fisken, the Mosler had a close race but no podium. Today however saw both drivers knuckle down and find their form to snatch the class victory. But the Brown/Fisken Mosler wasn’t the first car over the line – that honour went once again to the Invitation Class Ginetta of Oly Bryant and Joe Osborne, which Osborne hustled past both the Mosler and the Ascari in the closing laps of the race.
Simonsen started on pole in the Rosso Verde Ferrari, but any thoughts he might have had to enjoyed a Sunday afternoon drive were scuppered by Adam Wilcox in the VRS Ferrari, who muscled his way past and into the lead at the Deene hairpin on the opening lap. Shortly after, the pack was bunched up behind the Safety Car for six laps as the smouldering remains of the Ferrari of luckless MTECH were removed from the track, after the 430 caught fire.
At the restart Simonsen wasted no time in dispatching Wilcox but, by the time he pitted on lap 21 to hand over to Lester, his lead was only around 12 seconds, not enough for the Ulsterman to have much hope of maintaining the lead.
The Rollcentre team played a craftier game, Gregor Fisken wisely pitted early, as soon as the window allowed and handed over to Brown, who was able to climb steadily through the field as those ahead made their stops. Lester lost the lead to the Ascari on lap 24, David Jones having taken over from brother Godfrey, and on the same lap Hector was pushed back to fourth by Brown and Phil Burton, who had taken over from Wilcox.
A momentous tussle between Jones and Brown ensued, with the Mosler clearly having the edge in certain sections of the track. Ten laps from the end Osborne and the Barwell Ginetta joined in at the party, with the three cars playing cat and mouse. With five laps to go, Osborne dived down the Mosler’s inside at the hairpin to snatch second place. Two laps later some deft out-braking saw Joe snatch the lead from the Ascari into Brook.
The drama was not yet over for, on the final lap, Brown sneaked a cheeky pass on the Ascari to snatch GT3 class honours for the third time this season. Brown’s driving partner for the weekend, Gregor Fisken, paid this tribute: “Dan made up a lot of time when he got out on track. I don’t think the podium was ever in much doubt, but we are very pleased to take the win. He drove magnificently, picked his moment perfectly where the Ascari braked a bit late, and managed to get through. Today’s win was mostly Dan’s, I was just pleased to be along for the ride.”
Daniel now leads the championship by three points from Saturday GT3 winners Hector Lester and Allan Simonsen, and Gregor Fisken is in joint sixth with Craig Wilkins. It is proving to be a great season so far for the youngest team member of Rollcentre Racing.
