It proved to be a frustrating British GT Championship weekend for TF Sport as the series headed to Rockingham Motor Speedway for a two-hour endurance race on Sunday afternoon. After a complicated and somewhat chaotic race, the team took the chequered flag second with Derek Johnston and Marco Sørensen, only to be later served a 30 second time penalty which dropped the #17 Aston Martin Vantage to seventh position.
The duo qualified tenth in very tricky wet conditions on Saturday with Johnston making great progress though the field in the opening hour. He was however penalised for contact with a rival and had to serve a drive through penalty. This combined with the 15 second success penalty carried over from Oulton Park made it even more impressive as Sørensen moved further up the order before finishing second, just four seconds behind the race winner.
The sister #11 Aston Martin of Mark Farmer and Nicki Thiim started the race third, but almost from the outset the former suffered a throttle sensor problem. With the power cutting the engine, Farmer was forced to pull over and restart the car, resulting in the car going a lap down. Form here the duo pushed on – showing great pace – before finishing in eighth position.
“We feel we have been penalised twice in this race,” stated TF Sport Director Tom Ferrier. “We accepted the drive through penalty for contact with the #1 but we find the additional 30 seconds post-race hard to take.
“We’ve had two podiums with Derek and Marco, one of which we didn’t get to stand on, one of which was taken away after the event. We can only hope that we have better fortune over the rest of the season as we have a great team, great drivers and a real chance of wins and further podiums.”
TF Sport are next on track as the FIA World Endurance Championship gets underway this coming weekend at Spa-Francorchamps.
