Tom Sharp saw potential podium pace go unrewarded during a frustrating second meeting of the 2016 Porsche Carrera Cup GB season at Silverstone, in which he raced on the support bill of the prestigious FIA World Endurance Championship.
Sharp headed into the weekend with confidence high after taking a podium finish at the Brands Hatch season opener, and he had previously shown strong pace around the full Silverstone Grand Prix circuit in the British GT Championship and then last year on his Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup debut.
Friday practice saw Sharp get track time in both wet and dry conditions in his IDL Racing Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car, which proved to be crucial during a weekend of wildly changeable weather – the worst of which came on Saturday morning, with heavy snowfall leading to the cancellation of qualifying.
With championship order determining the grid, Sharp was set to line up third for the opening race later in the day. Whilst conditions had improved, the track was neither fully-wet nor fully-dry, leaving the team with a tricky decision on tyre choice.
Initially opting for wets, once Sharp hit the track for the formation lap he realised slicks were the way to go and made the decision to change to them before the start. That meant Sharp had to begin the race from the pitlane, putting him down in 22nd position at the end of the opening lap.
From there, the 24 year old mounted a remarkable recovery drive in incredibly tricky conditions, scything his way through the field with some slick overtaking moves as he climbed into the top ten within just six laps.
Working his way up to seventh soon after, Sharp then showed his sheer raw pace as he tried to close down a mammoth fifteen second gap to the next car on track in the final twenty minutes, narrowly missing out on the position as he took the chequered flag just 1.1 seconds adrift.
Sharp hoped to translate that race pace into a positive showing in dry conditions on Sunday morning, but the second race, televised live on Motors TV, proved to be a frustrating encounter as he found himself stuck behind Brands Hatch adversary Stephen Jelley.
Right in the middle of a three car battle for Jelley’s fourth position for the majority of the race, Sharp was clearly faster than the driver in front, but despite his best efforts throughout the first half of the race, he couldn’t find a way past.
The battle came to a head in the closing laps, with Sharp losing ground to Tom Oliphant on the penultimate tour, before joining his namesake in finally getting past Jelley on the final lap to finish in fifth position on the road.
Post-race however, Sharp was promoted to fourth after Oliphant was penalised for exceeding track limits whilst passing him. The weekend’s results puts the reigning Rookie class champion fourth in the points standings, just five points adrift of the top three.
Tom Sharp: “Following our positive start to the season at Brands Hatch, we were looking to return to the podium this weekend at Silverstone and put on a show in front of the World Endurance Championship crowd.
“Unfortunately it just didn’t come together for us this time out. The decision on tyres sadly cost us the chance of a top result in race one, but I was proud of the comeback drive, whilst we had the pace to challenge for third in race two, but just couldn’t get past Jelley soon enough.
“We’ve got a break now before the next rounds, so myself and the team will get the chance to sit back, study the first two weekends and make some improvements to the car to ensure we’re fighting for the podium again at Oulton Park.”
The trip to Cheshire comes in seven weeks’ time (04/05 June), with the Porsche Carrera Cup GB returning to the support package of the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship for the fifth and sixth rounds of the 2016 season.
Source. Simon Paice Media/Photo. John Patterson