Jessica Hawkins headed to Silverstone for the second meeting of the Mini Challenge (Cooper class) of the season around the national circuit, the layout the BTCC use.
Her debut weekend at Snetterton had gone nearly perfectly with pole in qualifying, two wins and a third in the reverse grid race. This meant she arrived at Silverstone with the championship lead, an incredible achievement considering this is her first ever season in the championship.
The question now was, could she repeat her success to extend her lead still further?
Qualifying saw Jessica take pole once again but she left it until the closing stages so set her pole time. When she did it was around a quarter of a second quicker than second place.
The weekend’s first race was later that same day and Jessica got a great start to lead in the first lap. Rival Sam Weller fought back however and passed Jessica for the lead. She wasn’t going to give in though and soon was back past him by the third lap. She then increased her lead over the remaining laps to win by two seconds.
Race two was on Sunday morning and this time she got not just a great start but a stunning first lap to pull away. No one could get close to catching her after that and she won by around three seconds.
Race three was the reverse grid race once again and Jessica would start fifth. She got a great start and was soon up to third with her team mate just in front, she pushed hard, trying to encourage her team mate to catch the leader. They were closing fast when suddenly the red flag came out for a crash further down the field. It was decided to declare a result leaving Jessica in third.
It was frustrating but her results for the meeting matched her Snetterton weekend and she has extended her championship lead. She is also now leading the Sunoco 240 challenge, a competition between the championships supplied by Sunoco which has the incredible prize of a support race drive at the Daytona 24 hours in the USA next year. It’s worked out on average point scores over the season and she currently leads it with 108.33.
Jessica was happy, despite the frustrating early finish to race three;
“It’s been another fantastic weekend in the Mini Challenge at Silverstone!
Pole, two wins and a third! Race three was gutting though as I was catching the leader and I think I could have made it three wins! A Top job by everyone at Excelr8. Once again thank you to BizKarts, Brian and my trusty mechanic Toyah Rule.”
Despite finishing third or better in every race she’s done so far in the Mini Challenge, incredibly Jessica still doesn’t have the funding to complete the season. She’s progressing to the stage where she may be able to do further races but she still faces the real prospect of losing out on her championship challenge from having to stop with a lack of money. If you are interested in backing someone who has demonstrated a clear talent in saloon car racing then get in touch.
Jessica’s next event is at Rockingham on June 23rd and 24th where she’ll be hoping to repeat the success she’s had at the first two events of the season to increase her championship lead still further.
The circuit is very different from either of the first two with it’s long banked first corner and infield section with both fast and slow corners. If Jessica can win again there then she will have proved that she can win anywhere! By Marc Waller
