BGTC: Oulton Park qualifying summary

Jordan & Kirkaldy battle for pole at Oulton

The Porsche 911 GT3-RS of Mike Jordan and the Ferrari 360 Modena of Andrew Kirkaldy took a pole position each for rounds nine and ten of the British GT Championship at Oulton Park this afternoon. Gavan Kershaw and Allan Simonsen shared pole honours in the dailysportscar.com Cup Class.

Jordan took an early advantage with the fastest time on a very wet track before the session was halted to recover the Ultima of Alan Bonner, which had spun at made heavy contact with the tyre wall at Bailey Bridge.

A five-minute thrash was all that was left for the rest of the grid to try and knock Jordan from the top spot. A slightly drier track saw the times tumble, but Jordan went quicker still, putting in a lap just over a second faster then rival Jonathan Cocker.

Peter Le Bas took third place in the Xero Corvette as the similar Embassy Racing machine of Neil Cunningham ended the session in fourth. The V8 engined car demoting Kershaw's lightweight Lotus Elise to fifth. The Cup Class car looked like it might challenge for outright pole in the wettest conditions with Kershaw convinced that he and driving partner Barrie Whight can get onto the overall podium if the weather stays gloomy.

"I reckon that third on the podium is possible for us if it stays wet," said Kershaw. "We can definitely surprise some of the big cars out there, but the weather keeps changing so quickly, it will definitely make it a good race for the fans," he added.

Nathan Kinch was only able to manage sixth fastest time. The RSR TVR T400R of Jonathan Coleman will line up seventh, just ahead of the Cup Class Porsche of Peter Chambers. His JWR team-mate David Jones took ninth place, out-qualifying the returning Eclipse Motorsport TVR T400R of Steve Hyde in tenth.

In the second session Andrew Kirkaldy stamped his authority on the rest of the field from the moment the green flag was waved. A superb lap of 1m50.428s was enough to take pole position in the Scuderia Ecosse Ferrari as the rest of the field tried to stay in touch.

Warren Hughes -- standing in for Tim Sugden, who is racing in the USA this weekend -- was second fastest but was unable to get onto terms with the Scot. His best lap was spoiled when Ni Amorim spun at Deer Leap, causing both the former Touring Car star and Patrick Pearce in the Mosler MT900R to back out of their fastest laps.

"There wasn't much of a dry line, more dry patches," said Kirkaldy. "The last lap would have been ok on intermediate tyres but it was wets all the way through. I am pleased with that lap though, especially with that much traffic," he added.

Godfrey Jones took third place as team-mates Mike Jordan and Mark Sumpter could only watch from the pit-garage with an electrical problem. Piers Johnson was obviously happy to be back in the British GT fray and posted fourth fastest time ahead of Pearce and Ricky Cole in the Corvette.

In the dailysportscar.com Cup Class Allan Simonsen snatched pole position in the final seconds of the session in the Glenvargill Ferrari 360. The Porsche duo of Adam Sharpe and Steve Wood picked up second and third places.

Qualifying -- Round 9
1 Jordan/Sumpter Porsche 911 GT3-RS 1m52.463s
2 Hughes/Cocker Porsche 911 GT3-RSR 1m53.622s
3 Cole/Le Bas Corvette C5R 1m54.331s
4 Cook/Cunningham Corvette C5R 1m55.527s
5 Kershaw/Whight Lotus Sport Elise 1m55.969s
6 Kinch/Kirkaldy Ferrari 360 Modena 1m56.413s

Qualifying -- Round 10
1 Kinch/Kirlkaldy Ferrari 360 Modena 1m50.428s
2 Hughes/Cocker Porsche 911 GT3-RSR 1m53.689s
3 Jones/Jones Porsche 911 GT3-RS 1m54.697s
4 Hyde/Johnson TVR T400R 1m55.892s
5 Stanton/Pearce Mosler MT900R 1m56.892s
6 Cole/Le Bas Corvette C5R 1m57.689s

-cm-