Edward Pearson endured a challenging weekend at Silverstone in the final GB3 Championship powered by the BRDC meeting before the summer break.
Edward headed into the weekend having shown strong pace in the previous meeting at Zandvoort, where he scored his best result of the campaign to date.
Two days of testing at the Home of British Motorsport provided Edward with plenty of time at the wheel of his Fortec Motorsport-run car, with the youngster ending the first day of running with the eleventh best time before finishing the second day in P12 - albeit with a time slightly quicker than he had managed 24 hours earlier.
Improving his time still further when qualifying came around on Saturday morning, Edward earned a place on the eighth row of the grid for the opening race, with his second best time meaning he would line up one place further back for race two.
Holding station by the end of the opening lap, Edward’s hopes of forward progress were thwarted by a safety car period to allow officials to recover a stricken car from the gravel, but on the restart he was able to battle his way up into 14th spot heading into the final stages.
Unfortunately, an issue with the left rear tyre saw him plummet down the order on the last lap to cross the line in 21st spot.
Although he lost ground on the opening lap of race two on Sunday morning, Edward fought hard to reclaim positions and battled his way back through to 17th by the flag to finish where he started - setting a fastest lap that was almost a second quicker than he had done the previous day.
Race three saw Edward once again line up in 16th spot for the start but contact on lap one dropped him to the back of the field and left him nursing damage that required a trip to the pits so that the team could check over the car.
The deployment of the safety car allowed Edward to close onto the rear of the field and, despite the damage, he fought hard to bring home a 19th place finish to cap a challenging weekend on track.
“Unfortunately it wasn’t the weekend I was hoping for, particularly after we showed decent pace in pre-event testing,” he said. “The times were so close in qualifying and the focus then was on trying to battle my way forwards in the three races to make the most of the pace we had in the car.
“Race one was going okay until an issue developed with the left rear that saw me slide back down the order and I didn’t feel entirely comfortable in race two but still managed to make my way back up the pack.
“In the final race, I was hit at Becketts on the first lap and from that point on it was an uphill battle with the damage to the car. I did the best that I could and now I can look to regroup during the summer break and look to come out fighting when we get to Donington Park in September.”
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