Blake Angliss saw a brilliant podium charge go sadly unrewarded as he put in an impressive performance on his second outing in the British GT Championship at Silverstone this past weekend (27-28 April).
The showpiece event of the British GT season and the biggest sportscar race in the UK, the Silverstone 500 brought together a huge 43-car entry for a three-hour spectacle around the world-famous Grand Prix circuit.
Following on from an encouraging championship debut at Oulton Park over Easter weekend, Angliss was hopeful of producing a strong performance behind the wheel of his Paddock Motorsport prepared McLaren Artura GT4 at the scene of his stunning four-win Ginetta performance last year.
His confidence rose with a positive run during official testing on Friday and despite changeable weather producing tricky conditions through free practice the next day, some great progress made in those sessions set the team up for a standout qualifying performance.
Angliss was on track for the opening ten-minute segment and lit up the timesheets, finishing fourth fastest in the packed 19-car GT4 entry. Team-mate Alex Walker followed up with a strong lap in his session too, meaning their combined efforts secured them a fantastic fourth on the grid for the main event.
It was Angliss who started the race, with the Coventry-based racer having to quickly adapt to treacherous, wet conditions. After a safety car start, he made an immediate impact as he passed the eventual race-winning McLaren on the first racing lap for a top three spot.
That set the tone for a race in which Angliss and Walker were right in the mix for a Silver class podium finish for a long time. Successfully negotiating full course yellow periods and tricky spells in traffic, their efforts combined with slick pitstops from the team kept them in contention.
Angliss impressed in his stints with good spells of consistent, fast lap times in the Artura as the weather continued to present a tough challenge. Unfortunately though, their podium challenge was derailed late on when Walker received a drive-through penalty for a full course yellow speed infringement.
Eventually taking the chequered flag ninth overall and fifth in the Silver class, whilst frustrated about losing a potential podium result, there were plenty of positives to take away as they cemented their status as front-runners in the competitive GT4 ranks.
Blake Angliss: “It’s frustrating to have a class podium and a top five overall finish in your reach and to miss out on it, but we’ve got to come away with our heads held high. We put in a great performance and showed we have the pace to challenge at the front of the field.
“It was a difficult race with the conditions constantly evolving. The track would start to dry out but not quite enough for slicks, so you had to really nurse the wets before another rain shower came. I felt I did a good job adapting to the track and keeping up a good pace.
“From where we were at Oulton Park, this has been a big jump forward all-round for us as a drivers, the team and the car. It proves we can take those steps forward and now if we can put all of the pieces of the puzzle together, we’ll be collecting some silverware soon.”
The 2024 British GT Championship returns to the track next month (25-26 May) for another three-hour race around the Donington Park Grand Prix circuit.
Angliss has some great commercial opportunities available for prospective partners to join him for his British GT campaign this year. Interested parties can get in touch with him via email, blake@anglissmotorsport.com.
Image from British GT / Jakob Ebrey Photography.