Racing for the first time at the spectacular Mugello Circuit near Florence, BRDC ‘Superstar’ Jake Hill took a commanding Pole Position, dominated the race but ultimately was denied a well-deserved debut victory in Simon Watts’ thunderous Panoz LMP07  LMP900 Le Mans car after a misunderstanding at the start.

Hill headed into qualifying on Friday never having driven the track, and on a soaking circuit with limited visibility took just two flying laps to take Pole Position for Saturday’s 40 minute race by a remarkable 6.5 seconds, opting to park the car to both save the tyres and avoid risking the car unnecessarily.

“The team at John Danby Racing gave me a fantastic car, which meant I had lots of confidence, so I was delighted and slightly surprised to take Pole by such a large margin against some very impressive competition”

Watts then qualified the car for his race on Sunday early on Saturday, the average of the two drivers times meaning Hill would start P8 for his race.

The rolling start saw Hill charging into turn one already up to second place behind Shaun Lynn’s 2003 Le Mans winning Bentley Speed 8 LMP900, immediately putting pressure on and slicing past him and into the lead at the end of the opening lap.

On a still greasy track, Hill set fastest lap after fastest lap and edged away over the first 11 laps, leading by over 16 seconds as the mandatory pit stops began.

Ranked as an ‘Elite’ driver Hill was held for an additional 60 seconds as a performance ‘penalty’ for his pitstop, and after the stops had all played out rejoined the action now second, and with a Safety Car neutralising the race.

As the race restarted, Hill now had several back markers to work through, gradually edging closer and closer as he set further fastest laps, and on the final lap had caught the sleek British Racing Green machine, dragging almost alongside to miss out on victory by a scant 0.154 seconds, and setting a new lap record in the process.

However Hill’s start was judged to have been too good, resulting in a   penalty which dropped the Kent-based 28 year-old back to third place overall behind the Riley & Scott of Micheron/Weil.

“Wow! That was fun! That was my first dry-weather laps in the Panoz since last Summer at Donington Park, and I have to say a huge thanks to Simon Watts for trusting me with his car, and John, Tom and the whole JDR crew for developing and preparing such an awesome machine. Really frustrating to be hit with a penalty and get held up in traffic, but fair play to Shaun he drove really well. Looking forward to getting back out in the car at Spa-Francorchamps next month”

Hill returns to the UK and is immediately back in action at Croft for the second Kwik Fit British Touring Car Championship test day in his ROKiT MB Motorsport BMW 330e M Sport, and is looking forward to building on his first outing at Donington Park last week.

“We had a great first day last week, getting to know the BMW and the new Hybrid system, so it should be great to see what we can learn at one of my favourite tracks, and one I won at last year”

Catch the action live on www.tsl-timing.com  from 9am on 6th April.

Lead image courtesy of Jakob Ebrey Photography.