Ben Creanor, at the wheel of the #77 OBU Student Challenge (Oxford Brookes) Citroen C1, took class pole position for the opening race of a triple-header for the Student Motorsport Challenge, the inter-series within the 2022 BRSCC Nankang Tyres CityCar Cup Championship. The young Dunfermline pilot lapped the 2.19-mile (3.52 kms) Lincolnshire circuit in 1:56.765, .338 seconds quicker than Andy Burgess in the #57 East Surrey College Peugeot 107 who finished second quickest in the seven-car class.
Completing the top three on the Student Motorsport Challenge grid was Richard Jepp in the #65 MET Motorsport Peugeot with a 1:57.307 to go eighth quickest overall
Creanor‘s pole position was his first of the season after starting second on the class grid at the previous round at Snetterton
The 15-minute session was delayed by nearly three-quarters of an hour due to a serious incident in the previous race. There was concern that the session might be abandoned due to the circuit curfew at 6.30pm but the BRSCC took the decision to shorten the previous contest to allow the 32-car CityCar Cup Championship to get out on-track after having waited all day.
Temperatures were starting to cool as qualifying got underway as Andy Burgess in the #57 East Surrey College Peugeot 107 set the first quick lap time of the SMo Challenge grid with a 2:00.705 and immediately beat that with a 1:58.557 to briefly set the third quickest time overall.
Richard Jepp and the #65 MET Motorsport Peugeot was second quickest in class as the session approached the half-way mark, lapping in 2:03.066.
With six minutes remaining, Ben Creanor in the #77 OBU Student Challenge Citroen C1 put in a 1:57.740 to second quickest in class, just .036 seconds slower the Burgess in the #57 car.
With less than three minutes to go, Creanor put in a flyer to take provisional class pole with a 1:56.421 on his fifth lap.
After having waited all day to get out on track, Ben Creanor was delighted with his qualifying result but still felt there was more in the #77 Citroen.
“It was a frustrating session because we couldn’t get the time and even on our best lap, we still had to deal with traffic,” said Creanor. “I think it shows that we’ve still got a car that can deliver because, even dealing with cars in our way, we still managed to pull out a lap like that.
“I’ve got a lot of confidence in the car and I’ve got a lot of confidence in the team that they can give me a car like that. It took a lot of commitment to put that lap together, especially dealing with slower cars. The fact that the car could deliver what I wanted it made it a phenomenal session.
“The target for us tomorrow is a class win. That was the goal coming into this weekend. It’s great to see that all the work is paying off and that we can fight for the class victory.”
Team Manager Harry O’Donoghue was very happy to see the efforts of his team pay off.
“It’s incredible, to be honest,” said O’Donoghue. “I can’t thank the boys enough. Everyone has been very focused, even outside of track day hours because we don’t have the car when we’re away from the track but the effort the boys have put in to get a car put together on sims, it’s incredible. We’ve put so much effort into its and it’s such a fantastic feeling!
“A class win would be good tomorrow. We have Andy Burgess behind us so hopefully we’ll have a good fight and we estimate ourselves to only be half a second off the overall front so hopefully we can get in the mix with the overall podiums.”
Daniel Lockett put the #23 Coleg Gwent (Blaenau) Peugeot fourth on the class grid, followed by Leon Wilde in the West Suffolk College car, Joe Miller in the SHU Karting entry and Ben Shaw in the Coleg Gwent (Newport) Citroen.
Sunday August the 21st will see three rounds of the BRSCC CityCar Nankang Tyres Cup Championship taking place with the scheduled rounds 11 and 12 getting underway at 09:30 and 14:35 and the lights going out for the rescheduled round 10, which was cancelled at Snetterton, at 17:50. Round 10 will see Ben Shaw in the #9 Coleg Gwent Newport Citroen C1 and the #25 SHU Karting Citroen with Joe Miller behind the wheel will be missing from the grid as neither driver participated at Snetterton.
