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Bryant & Smith Win Round 1 of 2019 2.0L Cup

Wednesday 10th April 2019

2018 2.0L Cup champions Olly Bryant and Andrew Smith had the perfect start to their 2019 title defence with a a win in mixed conditions at Barcelona Circuit on 7th April.

Driving the same 1964 Porsche 901 for Historika Racing Team as last year, Olly Bryant planted the silver machine on pole position in a very close qualifying session where the top 3 cars all recorded lap times within 6 tenths of a second.

The race was equally challenging with rain at the start testing Andrew Smith’s skill to the limit as he battled with the no.77 machine of Mark Sumpter. Before the pit-stops , Andrew had managed to build a cushion of 8 seconds over Sumpter. Classed as “elite” drivers in the 2019 regulations, Andrew & Olly both attract 20 second pit-stop penalties , leaving them with a 20 second net penalty against the solo-elite driven Sumpter machine. Olly proved up the challenge and despite emerging 12 seconds behind the leader, he chipped away at the deficit was able to catch Sumpter with 15 minutes to go. An epic battled then ensued, with Sumpter defending well and benefiting from higher top speed on the long main straight. Bryant managed to squeeze his way by on the penultimate tour and pushed hard to build a gap on the final lap, setting the fastest lap in the process.

“ I’d like to thank Smithy and Historika for a perfect job as always. We certainly had our work cut out this weekend, but once again Historika delivered us a car to do the job, another pole, race win and fastest lap might sound like it was an easy weekend, but it was far from the case. We’ll have to keep pushing to deliver strong results and I can’t wait for Spa!"

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