Wylie ends season with another top 10 finish
Written by author on September 14, 2015
Thornhill’s Ross Wylie brought the curtain down on his 2015 British GT Championship season when the Dumfries driver placed tenth at Donington Park yesterday.
The out-going British GT4 champion, along with Northern Ireland co-driver Andrew Watson, brought their Von Ryan Racing McLaren 650S GT3 sportscar home to their sixth top-10 result of the season in the two-hour event – the ninth and final race of 2015 which began in April.
Competing in the more powerful GT3 category for the first time this year Wylie, who celebrates his 24thbirthday on Tuesday (15 Sep), was selected as a McLaren GT “Young Driver” in January. Having to significantly adapt his driving style to suit the 650S GT3 sportscar, Ross nevertheless got to grips with the McLaren as the season progressed and was ultimately unlucky not to post multiple podiums during the course of the season.
Wylie set the fourth fastest time in his qualifying session with Watson 10th in his time trials around the sweeping 2.5-mile Leicestershire track on Saturday combining to earn a seventh place start on the 30-car grid the following day. Ross ran sixth early on before being muscled down to eighth but had made up a place by the time a Safety Car appeared approaching one-quarter distance for one of many on-track incidents. Wylie moved into sixth place on 45mins and handed over the McLaren to Watson at mid-distance from second amid frenzied pit-stop action.
The Ulsterman resumed sixth but slipped to 10th after contact with another car. Although Watson regained two places to eighth at the chequered flag, a position that would have earned Wylie and Watson the championship’s prestigious Silver Cup, a 16-secs time penalty handed out by officials hours after the race, dropped the duo to 10th in the final official race results and deprived them of the silverware by 20.5-points.
