Max Marzorati and Connor Grady share the Renault UK Clio Cup Junior championship lead after the first round of the season, in which only seven drivers competed.
Marzorati took the first win of the season after backing up from fifth on the grid. JamSport Racing’s Ethan Hammerton bounced back from a retirement in the opening race to claim victory in race two.
Hammerton and Jack Young broke away from the rest of the field early in race one, but fell back in the chasing pack when they began to battle for the lead. Pole sitter Lorcan Hanafin and Marzorati joined the pair in a four-way battle for the lead.
After an incident at the Wilson hairpin, Young fell back through the pack whilst Hammerton was forced to retire with damage. Hanafin emerged from the battle with the race lead, but Marzorati found his way past to take the race victory.
Hanafin stayed close to Marzorati to finish second, only to be excluded from the results for driving unsafely whilst battling for the lead.
Louis Doyle, who narrowly beat Grady to third on the track, inherited second.
Starting fifth for race two, Hammerton jumped into the lead on the second lap of the race. He slowly built up a lead to the rest of the field, finishing more than two seconds ahead of pole sitter young.
A poor start for Marzorati put the race one winner on the backfoot. He dropped to the back of the field and finished four and a half seconds behind the closest driver. The Team Pyro driver managed to close the gap to less than two seconds before the end of the race but was unable to move up the order.
Grady passed Gustav Burton to take his second podium of the weekend, allowing him to match Marzorati on points a quarter of the way through the championship.
Image credit: Renault UK Clio Cup Junior Press Office
