Photo: PSP Images

Whyte takes Brands Hatch pole despite charging Meins

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Stewart Whyte held on to pole position for round 5 of the HSCC Super Touring Championship at the Brands Hatch Historic Superprix despite a late charge from Richard Meins’ Ford Mondeo.

A depleted field, dropped down to eight following the withdrawals of John Cleland and Dave Jarman, took to the Brands Hatch GP circuit for the twenty minute session under cool but dry conditions.

The first representative times came after around five minutes of running as the front runners got heat in to their tyres, with Whyte’s Honda Accord storming to the top with a 1:37.744, which he would then better the next time by with a 1:35.708. Meanwhile, Richard Meins was getting to grips with his Mondeo, which he had barely had any seat time in until the session began, holding third place behind Whyte and Graeme Dodd’s Nissan Primera.

James Dodd then joined the fray, moving in to second ahead of his father, but despite improving his own time on the next lap was still 1.4 seconds behind Whyte. At that point the top three seemed happy with their times, pushing their cars back in to the garage and watching the final five minutes.

“I wasn’t too pleased with this session really,” Whyte told TouringCarTimes.com. “I went off at Westfield and got some gravel on the tyres so I thought there was no point risking it. Hopefully we can get some quicker times in the race, but with the other cars close on times it should be a good race.”

Meanwhile, Meins was getting up to speed, slowly working his way up the field, knocking on the door of a front-row start before a stunning final lap took him up to second place, just 0.078 seconds off the pole-sitter.

“I’m pleased with that,” offered Meins. “We only had a few laps at Silverstone [Classic Media/Test day], so this is our first proper dry run. To be just seven hundredths off pole is brilliant, and this thing has immense corner speed.”

Further down the field, Harry Whale, who spent much of the first half of the session in the pits, was the fastest of the non-ST1 cars, just 0.106 ahead of the BMW E3 M3 of Mark Smith.