Joseph Loake didn’t just leave Oulton Park with a first GB3 win and as the early championship leader, but he also broke the Cheshire circuit’s outright lap record that had stood since 2011. That record-breaking effort in race one secured him the first Sunoco Fastest Driver of the Weekend Award of the season.
With the GB3 car benefiting from an upgrade over the winter, lap times across pre-season testing had regularly been quicker than those seen last year at most circuits, but at Oulton Park, pre-season testing times and laps from last week, were all well below the previous benchmark.
Loake set a 1m27.958s lap in qualifying, the first sub-1m28s lap at the venue since 2011. Then in the race, having come close, he finally eclipsed the outright lap record, which is always taken from races, on the eighth lap of the encounter.
His effort of 1m28.619s eclipsed Lucas Foresti’s British F3 time of 1m28.669s set 12 years ago, by 0.050s.
“It’s pretty special, these cars are so, so quick that it’s pretty mental to be able to drive one of these in the first place” Loake said. “To set the fastest lap that’s ever been set in one, and the fastest lap ever recorded here is a really special moment for me and I wouldn’t have expected it coming into the weekend.”
“All the way through pre-season I was struggling quite a bit, but the struggles were worth it and I think that has shown this weekend and the pace has been really strong as we’ve proven. I’m really, really happy.”