Juno Racing Take Both Class Wins and Dominate the Britsports Top Five at Silverstone

27 March 2006

Juno Racing’s impressive start to the 2006 season continued unabated on Saturday (25th March) as they took not only both class wins in the Britsports event but four of the top five overall spots!

The opening round of the Britsports series saw four Junos line up on the grid. In the Juno Sports Prototype #70, Andy Schulz took the wheel for the entire two hour event as partner, and car owner, Mike Roberts was unfortunately unable to take part after being called away following Friday’s test day. Of course, Mike had already proved the cars winning pedigree with a victory the weekend before at the Brands Hatch Sport and GT Challenge.

In the WSG (Worldwide Solutions Group) backed Juno SS3 #69, was the Welsh-Anglo pairing of Jeff Davies and Neill Briggs.

Fresh from their stunning debut in the VdeV Championship where they finished third in the 4Hours of Jarama, Adrian Mardlin and Rob Croydon lined up in the RSR Racing Juno SS3-CN. On their return from Spain, a transporter break down saw the car stranded in France requiring a trailer mercy dash to get the car to Silverstone in time and meaning it took to the track virtually untouched since the Jarama race.

Robert Oldershaw and Richard Gomes made up the Juno quartet, sporting the Juno SS2-V6 #51.

Racing on the International circuit, the Juno domination certainly didn’t make for dull racing as the front saw plenty of action. The early lead was taken by Oldershaw/Gomes followed by Davies/Briggs and Schulz in third. The close and exciting battles unfortunately saw a racing incident between Schulz and Davies result in the Davies #69 car losing a couple of laps but after a return to the pits, refuel and brush up he was soon scything back through the field.

After a round of pitstops Schulz took the lead and edged out a comfortable margin. The Mardlin/Croydon car was circulating like clockwork, a continuation of their strong showing in Jarama.

As the final 30minutes approached the weather took a turn for the worse and the rain fell making for difficult decisions on whether to change to wets. With such a dominate lead the team elected to keep Schulz out on slicks to ‘tip-toe’. Elsewhere, a puncture made the decision for Oldershaw/Gomes.

By the chequered flag, Schulz took the win by a lap whilst Mardlin/Croydon took the Class 2 win and third overall. Davies/Briggs finished in fourth whilst Oldershaw/Gomes were classified fifth rounding out what was a dominant Juno display.

Race Winner, Andy Schulz said, "I can only describe the Juno as awesome. It was my first time in the car during Friday testing and immediately I was struck by what a fantastic car it is and what potential there is. The race handling was superb and the team were second to none. The teamwork and communications were brilliant and I’d like to extend my thanks for their warm welcome and for a wonderfully professional experience. It was a thoroughly enjoyable race, we built up a huge lead and in some respects the tricky situations towards the end of the race, when the track was extremely slippery, proved helpful in the fact it kept your concentration sharp.

"It was great of Mike Roberts to allow me to race his pride and joy! It was shame he wasn’t able to compete this weekend but I can guarantee he has a car that is capable of flying this season!"

Juno Racing Team Director, Ewan Baldry added, "This was actually a very emotive weekend for the team as I feel we really showed just what the Junos are capable of. We are confident in our cars and coming off the back of the excellent VdeV debut I feel this weekend has gone a great way to justifying that confidence. People were clearly impressed and that is a great compliment to all the team.

"This weekend also demonstrated a high level of teamwork as over the winter we have worked hard on ensuring our logistics and race practices reflect our commitment, professionalism and ambition as a team. We have set ourselves high standards and are committed to being as competitive as we can be this season as we strive to achieve our short and long term goals."

RH

See 2006 series calendar for EERC Britsports Championship

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