Will Jenkins Salvages Points From Bruising Croft Weekend

Will Jenkins produced a superb race two recovery drive to salvage some crucial championship points at the end of an immensely challenging trip to Croft in the Porsche Carrera Cup GB this past weekend (05-06 September).

Returning to the scene of his maiden class podium finish in the Carrera Cup GB last season, sadly this year’s trip to North Yorkshire proved to be a much tougher affair as Jenkins had to bounce back from qualifying confusion and an unfortunate early incident in race one.

The Staffordshire racer, who is competing as part of the Wera Alliance Academy, produced some promising lap times in free practice on Friday. That put him in an optimistic mood for qualifying the next day, however it ended up being a nightmare session.

Jenkins posted a lap time good enough for second place on the timesheets, but unfortunately due to a confusion on the track limits rulings, he had four lap times removed. Despite the majority of drivers on the grid all having laps removed, he was unsuccessful in his appeal to the stewards.

This left him 14th and last on the grid for the opening race on Sunday. It went from bad to worse in that one though, as while trying to make early progress in wet conditions, he was squeezed onto the grass heading into Tower corner.

Powerless to slow down the car on the slippy surface, he skidded into the tyre wall. The subsequent damage to the front of his Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car forced him to retire in the pitlane, and left Team Parker Racing with a short window to make repairs ahead of race two.

The team successfully completed the task and Jenkins was able to take up his position at the rear of the grid again. This time around he was able to make progress though, pulling off some good overtaking moves around a notoriously difficult circuit to secure a hard-fought fifth place finish in the PRO class.

Jenkins remains second in the championship heading into the penultimate round of the season at Silverstone (26-27 September). He races thanks to the crucial support of his loyal personal partners Asset Alliance Group, The Reefer Trailer Centre, Hopkins Race Transporters, Barkers Finance, SAF Holland, The Green Group and WS Transportation.

Will Jenkins: “It really wasn’t the weekend we hoped for. We had good pace in the car and I’m confident that we would have been up there fighting for podium finishes, but unfortunately circumstances transpired against us and I had to just salvage some points from race two.

“The confusion surrounding the track limits in qualifying was incredibly frustrating and ended up costing us a lot of potential points this weekend. I was keen to fight forward in race one, but it ended up getting away from me on the first lap.

“I had to take the chance around the outside at Tower, but got squeezed out wide and ultimately was a passenger on the grass. Thank you to the team for a great job to get the damage repaired, the car was back to 100% for race two.

“Croft is narrow and very hard to overtake around in these cars, but I went full send and I’m very happy to have been able to make up a lot of places. That recovered some points which is crucial, and now it’s about resetting and preparing to take on Silverstone next.”