Tuesday, 22nd April 2008

Points at Silverstone for Apex squad.

Phil Quaife enjoyed a solid debut for the Apex Motorsport team at Silverstone as the Jaguar squad hit the track for the first time since the death of team principal Richard Lloyd last month.

The 22-year-old completed a late deal to line up alongside Stuart Hall for the opening rounds of the FIA GT3 European Championship and secured a place on the front row of the grid for the first one-hour race of the weekend.

At the start he blasted into the lead and pulled out a healthy advantage in the early stages although his lead was wiped out after 15 minutes of the hour-long race when he hit a patch of oil and ran wide at Stowe and found himself back in the clutches of pole-sitter Mickael Forsten.

Advertisement

A sustained period of light drizzle affected the handling of the Jaguar and having slipped to third place, he handed over to Hall for the second half of the race – with the former Rollcentre Racing man eventually taking the flag in fifth place.

“Things looked very promising as we pulled away in the lead early on, but the Jag wasn't as easy to drive in the wet conditions,” Quaife admitted. “To score points though is a great start to the season and if it hadn't have rained I'm confident that we could have scored a podium at the very least.”

Hall took the start for race two and made decent progress from his grid position on row eight. He continued to move through the field in the early stages but was then barged off the track by one of the Aston Martin DBRS9s, the impact causing bodywork damage which eventually led to a puncture.

The incident occurred before the driver change pit window opened, meaning Hall had to pit once for new tyres and again soon after to hand to Quaife, losing a lap in the process. As he rejoined, further misfortune struck the team as they were adjudged to have exited the pit lane before the minimum time of 70 seconds allowed for each driver change had elapsed.

The resulting stop/go penalty put the pair a further lap off the pace, and while Quaife posted some very competitive lap times in the closing stages, he could only recover to 31st at the flag.

Related Images

[Top of Article]