Barwell Lamborghini pair Alex Martin and Jarrod Waberski leapt to the top of the British GT points table with a composed win in the championship’s away-day race at Spa last weekend.
The duo retained command of a frequently interrupted two-hour contest, staying in front and just out of reach of their pursuers throughout. Their win was set up by a fine rolling launch by Martin from the second row to claim a lead on the inside of Eau Rouge that they would not relinquish.
Martin and Waberski are a new pair for 2026, with well-established Amateur driver Martin joined for the first time by youthful former GB3 and GB4 racer Waberski, who switched to GT competition last year. In the opening rounds of this season, they have operated slightly under the radar. At Spa, they struck.
Their success was also Barwell’s landmark 30th British GT victory with a Lamborghini.
At the off, Martin ambushed poleman Simon Orange on the steep plunge to Eau Rouge to lead. The race began there, rather than on the usual Formula 1 start-finish line, because British GT was sharing the track for the first time in a decade. The French GT4-based FFSA GT, and its regular partner the Alpine Cup, combined to create a grid of more than 50 cars.
Even before Martin pulled off his Turn 1 move, things had been attritional among the frontrunners. Kevin Tse and Ben Green’s 2 Seas Mercedes was the initial polesitter but was disqualified from qualifying for a ride-height infringement, meaning it started from the back of the GT3 cars. The other Barwell Lamborghini Huracan, shared by Rob Collard and Hugo Cook, suffered a similar fate after Collard lost all his qualifying laps to track-limits offences.
Then, just as all were lining up for the race, second-place starter Morgan Tillbrook pitted his Optimum McLaren with an electrical issue. He resumed off the back of the pack.
Electrical issue for Optimum McLaren left Barnicoat (r) fighting through the pack
Photo by: JEP
An upshot of the large field was frequent and lengthy caution periods, accounting for about half of the race. A further side effect was that a full-course yellow followed by a safety car at the time of the mid-race pitstop window went a long way to negate any success penalties served in the stops.
Yet, while plenty went on, Martin and Waberski for the most part had some air between their car and second place, and looked confident on the many restarts.
The Orange Racing by JMH McLaren that Orange shared with Marcus Clutton, the Marc Warren/Jack Brown Optimum McLaren and the other Barwell Lamborghini of Collard and Cook – Collard having astonishingly charged to fourth on lap one after his qualifying woes – were the leader’s closest pursuers.
Ross Gunn in his Beechdean Aston Martin had looked well placed behind, having benefited from the effective minimisation of the car’s success penalty from its fine Oulton Park showing. But the Aston’s race unravelled when, under another caution, Gunn passed Brown’s McLaren. Gunn said it happened because Brown slowed dramatically, and he slowed himself to try to usher Brown back ahead, but Brown would not pass back under caution unless directed to do so by an official. The Beechdean Aston got a 20-second post-race penalty, which left it 11th.
Brown’s own race soon unravelled too, as he lost places in what he called a “messy” restart and then picked up rubber on his tyres. His McLaren subsequently suffered a puncture after contact with Charles Clark.
But we had the visual feast of a charging Ben Barnicoat to saviour. Safety cars had got the Optimum McLaren on the back of the pack after Tillbrook’s early pitstop delay, and Barnicoat rose rapidly from 11th.
By the end he was third, having passed Cook’s Lamborghini thrillingly at Eau Rouge on the final lap. Barnicoat came close to taking second from Clutton too, but the Orange McLaren kept the place after a worthy run, enabled by practice set-up changes improving the drivers’ confidence. However, Barnicoat – like everyone else – could not get on the bumper of Martin and Waberski’s Lamborghini.
“The car was mega, the team did a great job,” Waberski said. “Alex nailed the start and then controlled the first stint with all the traffic and safety car restarts. And then the same in the second one [where Waberski drove].
“I knew the McLaren was really good in sector two. We were a bit better in sectors one and three, so for me it was tyre management in sector two, so that I could maximise traction, and braking and traction into the slow-speed stuff and make sure I’ve got a really good exit that I could slowly build a gap that way.
“So as soon as we had a safety car restart, I had the grip available then to use it and get away again. And then, still pushing but managing.”
Turner/Lavery overcome plethora of penalties for another GT4 win
Success handicap, flag infringement and grid drop didn’t stop Aston from winning
Photo by: JEP
Dan Lavery and Darren Turner overcame 30 seconds’ worth of in-race penalties plus a five-place grid drop to claim their second British GT win in a row, in a madcap GT4 race at Spa.
The Grange Racing with FSR Aston Martin pair had to add an extra 20s to their pitstop time for winning the previous race at Oulton Park, then at Spa Lavery acquired an extra 10s for overtaking before the green flag at a safety car restart. The grid penalty came because Lavery missed a red flag in a Spa practice session and his resultant behavioural points triggered the sanction.
Yet Lavery charged from 10th on the grid to reach third place in his race-opening stint then, as was the case in the GT3 contest, the caution during the pit window did much to negate the Aston’s additional stop time.
It left Turner third in the bunched pack, behind leader Mikey Porter’s Optimum McLaren and Hadley Simpson’s championship-leading Innovation Ginetta.
Simpson fell away in the race’s second half, leaving a top three of Porter, Turner and Jack Mitchell’s Toro Verde GT Ginetta. The trio ran thrillingly in close company with each other and amid seemingly never-ending traffic from FFSA GT and Alpine Cup competitors.
Turner’s traffic skills proved crucial, as first the three-time Le Mans class winner dived past Porter to lead, then he used the same skills to stay ahead of Porter and Mitchell, who Turner admitted had more pace in clear air.
Turner and Lavery are relishing their recent success
Photo by: JEP
Turner paid tribute to Lavery too: “He’s proving exceptional. It’s his first year in GT racing and his pace is fantastic.”
Porter finished second in his McLaren shared with Josh Stanton; Porter had only found out on the Friday morning that he would be driving, replacing Stanton’s regular partner Luca Hopkinson. Saturday practice was therefore his first time in the car.
Mitchell was third and the Ginetta shared by Simpson and Thomas Holland dropped to finish sixth, despite Holland climbing to first in his opening stint. They still lead the table, but are only 1.5 points ahead of MK Racing Aston pair Jessica Hawkins and Will Orton, who recovered to fifth after a qualifying off.
Revie Lake, the youngest driver in the field, led the opening stint in fine style with his McLaren – freshly switched from Mahiki Racing to Paddock Motorsport – until suspected electrical gremlins, leading to a gearbox problem, dropped it from contention.
Huge combined field meant traffic was regularly a problem
Photo by: JEP
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– The Autosport.com Team
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