Rookie Will Macintyre took a sensational victory on his GB3 Championship debut at a soaking wet Oulton Park on Easter Monday. The 16-year-old drove brilliantly in his Hitech GP machine to clinch the win in the reverse grid race at the opening weekend of the 2024 GB3 season.
Starting fifth on the grid, Will made a superb start in the pouring rain and was up to third by the second lap after two great passing moves in the treacherous conditions. After a Safety Car period to retrieve a couple of stricken runners, Will had moved up to second place when the green flags were waved with just four minutes left on the clock.
After the race leader appeared to slow with a suspected mechanical issue, Will swept into the lead on the final lap to round off an excellent debut weekend in GB3: “I’m absolutely delighted to take the win in such difficult conditions and I’m proud of the whole Hitech GP team after such a strong start to our campaign,” said Will, who sits fourth overall in the standings on 53 points.
“It was really difficult to see because of the spray, but I was just focusing on the rain light of the car in front. It’s always hard to overtake at this track, but we kept it on the black stuff and it resulted in the win. It’s a perfect way to start my first-ever GB3 season!”
Earlier in the day, Will had finished sixth in race two (from eighth on the grid) and was ninth in Saturday’s opener which took place in dry and sunny conditions. Gerrard Xie was the highest finishing Hitech GP runner in race one, taking a strong fourth place, but after running wide at Old Hall in the wet during the latter stages of race two, he was classified fifth at the flag. Gerrard leaves Oulton Park with 46 points (in sixth) after ending the weekend with tenth in the final 25 minute encounter.
Tymek Kucharczyk had a chance of a podium finish at the second race of the weekend on Easter Monday morning. After starting sixth, Tymek was easily the quickest in the field and made a terrific start, passing three cars on the opening lap. Sadly, after challenging Louis Sharp for second place late-on, the pair made contact and Tymek was forced to retire with a broken front wing.
“I had a really good first lap, as I had the confidence to brake much later than my rivals and that was the key to finding the pace which enabled me to do a lot of overtaking,” said Tymek. “After the Safety Car, I was unlucky with the contact and lost a lot of points. But that’s racing. I’m obviously frustrated to lose a guaranteed podium, but now I’m fully focused on the next round.”
After retiring from race two, Tymek clinched fourth in the reverse grid race (which added to his sixth from Saturday) puts him ninth overall on 33 points. The next outing for Hitech GP’s GB3 trio is at Silverstone on April 27-28th.
