The #5 Greystone GT GT3 Silver-Am father-and-son pairing of Stewart and Lewis Proctor finished 12th overall in the Round Four of the 2022 Intelligent Money British GT Championship, making up two places on their starting grid position of 14th. In the GT3 Silver-Am category the duo finished on the final step of the podium, their third podium finish of the season so far.
After having qualified 14th on the overall grid ahead of Sunday May 29’s three-hour contest, the team worked hard on set-up changes ahead of the race, work that paid off after Lewis Proctor headed the timing screens during the morning warm-up.
20 seconds lost during the Safety Car period and another unscheduled stop for mechanical problems meant that an improvement in their class podium position was out of reach.
Lewis Proctor was in an up-beat mood as he left the Leicestershire circuit.
“We made a huge amount of progress from Thursday testing through to the race so I feel pretty positive leaving,” he said. “If you look at our pace as a whole on Sunday, I’d say third in Silver-Am is about where I’d expect us to be as a pairing. We had to chase the set-up on Thursday because the track conditions changed so much it was impossible to get a baseline reading of where we were and even by qualifying we weren’t really in the window.
“But some pretty big set-up changes for raceday transformed the McLaren. I was quickest in warm-up and both Dad and I had a lot more confidence to push in the race. We definitely lost time with what happened with the Safety Car but you simply can’t know that until after the event.
“What was important is that the McLaren was fast in clean air – my fastest lap was faster than the class winner – and that means we’ll go to Snetterton with a lot more confidence to do even better.”
Team Principal Mark McLoughlin is now looking forward to improving on the #5 car’s class podium finishes at the next round.
“To finish on the Silver-Am podium again is very satisfying because we had to work really hard as a team from Thursday onwards to give Lewis and Stewart a car they really felt they could race with,” said McLoughlin. “The McLaren was much more to their liking on raceday and both of them had the speed to move forwards during their stints.
“We’ve been on the podium in our class in all three of our British GT weekends and it feels good, especially in the Silver-Am class that’s more competitive than a year ago. The task now is to work with Lewis and Stewart to move towards the top step at Snetterton next time.”
Rounds Five and Six of the Intelligent Money British GT Championship take place at Snetterton on June 25 – 26.
