PLOWMAN & SMITH BATTLE THROUGH BRUISING SILVERSTONE 500 BRITISH GT WEEKEND

From being flooded by the great British weather, to being rammed early in the race and even cruelly robbed of a finish late on, Martin Plowman & Mark Smith battled against pretty much everything the Silverstone 500 race weekend could throw at them with the pairing managing extensive damage to their McLaren 720S GT3 Evo for virtually the entire race distance before the car finally succumbed in the closing moments. This was a weekend that never quite settled down from start to finish. Having shown solid pace during pre-event testing, Saturday proved a near-total washout, with qualifying eventually having to be abandoned due to rivers of rainwater running across the track and standing water making it too dangerous for the cars to run. That meant the grid for Sunday’s race had to be set by combining each driver’s fastest time from second practice, which was the first blow to their hopes as they had spent that session concentrating on long-run pace rather than outright speed. It meant Smith and Plowman would start from P14 in the 43-car grid. Regardless, the potential was there to push forward in the race. However, the second blow was struck by another McLaren, which rammed into the rear of Smith’s car as he took avoiding action when a Porsche had been spun out in front of him early in the race. Smith had been working his way up the order and hovering around the top 10 at that point, but extensive damage to the McLaren’s rear diffuser made the GT3 a real handful from then on. Smith and Plowman continued to push as best they could, and their consistency helped them manage both the aero issue and a worsening oil leak and climb the order toward what would have been an against-all-odds points finish when Plowman rejoined for the final stint running eighth. However, he was forced to park the McLaren a lap early when the oil finally ran out. They were eventually classified 11th in class – unjust reward for the #11 crew’s efforts. Martin Plowman said: “It’s been a disappointing weekend all-round really, but we have to look at the positives, which were that we continued to fight and so nearly earned some points, despite carrying a lot of damage for over two hours of racing. Mark was so unlucky to get hit early in his stint and that gradually destroyed the aero balance of the car so we were really struggling in the late stages. But the way Mark handled the car and managed to drive around the limitations brought on by the damage was seriously impressive. We managed to stay in the mix for points, then right before the finish... just when we had a decent result in sight, we got an engine oil warning and had to stop the car. It’s gutting, but we’ll come out fighting again at Donington Park.”