Smalley shines on Porsche Supercup debut in front of capacity Silverstone crowd
Adam Smalley made an impressive debut appearance in the international Porsche Supercup at the weekend (July 1-3) as he finished just outside the top ten in front of a sold-out crowd of some 142,000 fans at Silverstone.
The current Porsche GB Junior Driver sits just four points off the lead in the Porsche Carrera Cup GB so far this season but tested himself against the world’s best in a one-off entry at the British Grand Prix with French outfit CLRT, though his regular Redline Racing mechanics prepared his machine for him.
Taking his Porsche 911 GT3 Cup car onto the full Silverstone layout for the first time, the Lancastrian had just one 45-minute practice session held at 19:20 on Friday evening to familiarise himself with the 5.891 km circuit before qualifying the following evening, having missed the pre-event tests owing to the late nature of his deal.
In qualifying, the grid was decided in the early stages as rain began to fall, meaning drivers who went for a fast initial lap were rewarded with a high grid slot, while those who couldn’t find a clear lap had to make do with the track in less-than-optimal conditions, Adam finishing 17th quickest after receiving contact from another car as well as having to avoid spinning machines on the greasy surface.
He made amends on Sunday however, producing a strong drive in front of the home crowd. After falling back at the start, he fought his way past a number of series regulars and crossed the line just behind CLRT colleague Marvin Klein, claiming 12th position after 14 laps of racing.
Adam will next be in action in his regular Porsche Carrera Cup GB seat with Duckhams Yuasa Racing with Redline at Knockhill in Scotland over July 30/31, making the halfway point of the season.
Adam Smalley
Grid: 17, Race: 12
It’s been absolutely amazing to make my Porsche Supercup debut. I've never driven Silverstone in this car, so we were properly in the deep end. In practice we ran race tyres from Imola. We missed the three-day official test, so everyone else knew where they were braking and which gears to use.
Qualifying was just chaos. I was gutted. We went out of the pits, it started to rain, and it got really heavy, so we had one push lap on slicks, but it was greasy. I went out, saw a fast driver a few cars ahead of me, was chasing them down, and got contact from behind which put me on a wet patch. I had four cars pass me in Maggots and Becketts, and then two of them spun, so it was literally just avoiding cars for a lap. I was pretty gutted to start P17, but the race was really good.
We dropped back to 20th at the start, avoiding cars at turn one, but then managed to pick them off and got into some tussles along the way, and finished P12 at the flag. It was a great experience and there was lots learnt to help my Carrera Cup GB campaign. Working with CLRT was fantastic, but having the guys at Redline – Spike, Guy, Alex, and Simon was great and a thank you to Chris as none of this would have been possible without him. I'm really looking forward to seeing what's next.
