The 19-year-old single-seater ace, in his first season of car racing
action, showed terrific pace during round 15 qualifying on Saturday, 18th
August, to just miss out on a maiden series pole position by a mere eight 100ths
of a second for the New Ollerton squad.
At the start of the first of the weekend’s two races, Sims didn’t make the
best getaway but he remained close to pole-sitter and eventual winner Duncan
Tappy for the duration of the 24-lap encounter and actually pulled out a huge
eight and a half second cushion over third placed Adriano Buzaid in tricky
drying conditions.
During the second race, Sims moved into seventh position from eighth on the
grid but with just a handful of laps remaining a strange accident on the entry
to Clearways saw him forced to retire from the race after shooting nose-in to
the tyre barriers.
Closer inspection by the Manor team this morning has revealed Sims had
picked up a very slow puncture, nothing larger than a pin-hole in the tyre,
which was the reason for his car snapping out of control without warning.
Kris Loane achieved a brace of seventh place finishes from the weekend to
secure his most consistent set of results and biggest haul of points from any of
the eight race meetings which have been contested to date this year.
In round 16 qualifying particularly, the Northern Ireland star did a superb
job by qualifying a stunning fifth fastest, just two 10ths of a second shy of
pole position and quicker than title contender Dean Smith.
In the races, top seven and top eight finishes were good reward and while
disappointed not to capitalise on his third row start in round 16, Loane really
does look to be coming on in leaps and bounds as a very rapid driver.
Welsh star Alex Morgan could have been forgiven for approaching round 15
with some trepidation after suffering some big accidents in wet conditions but
rather than that, he produced one of the better performances of his season with
ninth position from 13th on the grid. At the chequered flag, he was just half a
second behind eighth spot.
Round 16 saw Morgan classified in 12th position after a trickier run, he
did cross the line in 13th place but a post-race exclusion for race-winner
Duncan Tappy due to a technical infringement saw the 18 finishers each move up a
position. This, of course, meant Loane achieved another top seven even though
crossing the line in eighth place.
“We’re obviously very happy to be back on the podium, had Alexander made a
good start I’m sure we’d have been able to challenge harder for the win but
second is still a good result”, said Manor team boss Tony Shaw, “It’s a great
shame he had the off at Clearways in race two as he was driving well and
pressuring the cars ahead.
“We’ve scoured the car this morning and managed to find a tiny pin-hole
in one of the tyres which was the reason for the accident. We all knew it seemed
very strange for Alexander to crash there like that, our thinking is that
without the intervention of the Safety Car the puncture was so slow he may have
just got away with it to the end.
Shaw added: “Kris’ qualifying performance in the second session especially
on Saturday was superb and it was frustrating for him and us to see him slip
down the order outside the top 10 after a bad start. He fought back well though
and a couple of top sevens isn’t bad at all.
“Alex really needed a big confidence boost from the wet race and that’s
exactly what he got with a good drive. He’s had some big accidents in those
conditions so to come through inside the top 10 from 13th on the grid was
excellent. All in all it’s been a pretty good weekend, we know we could have had
more but we’re not unhappy.”
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