Weston Hills racer Johnathan Hoggard enjoyed another impressive weekend in the BRDC British F3 Championship – but lost ground on the series leader.
Fortec Motorsports ace Hoggard claimed third place in race one at Silverstone, but could only manage 14th position in race two before completing the weekend with a solid fifth in the third race.
That leaves the teenager some 12 points behind championship leader Clement Novalak with three races to come at Donington Park on September 14 and 15.
Qualifying saw Hoggard in strong form, as his best time was just 0.225secs off that of pole holder Kiern Jewiss and saw him fourth for race one.
He also managed to bag third place for race three with his second best qualifying time (race two starts with the grid in reverse order to the finishing positions in race one).
The opening race saw Hoggard’s best performance of the weekend. The race was won by Hillspeed’s Sasakorn Chaimongkol, who jumped Jewiss at the start to secure his first-ever F3 win.
Hoggard did jump up to third to secure another podium and gained nine points on Novalak, who could only manage seventh.
Speaking to www.britishF3.com after the race, Hoggard said: “It was a pretty good race, it was all really done off the line and then into Maggotts and Becketts where I managed to get past him (Simmons) as I think he had a moment going around the right hander.
“That put him back with the rest of the pack. I challenged Kiern (Jewiss) a little bit going into Brooklands one lap but after that there wasn’t really too much going on.
“Maybe I could have pushed on a little bit more if I didn’t have Kiern in front of me, he seemed a little bit slower off the start but then he picked up the pace towards the end of the race. I think he wanted to get into P1 but other than that, that was the race.
“It’s been a good result with Clement (Novalak) finishing seventh.”
Hoggard’s Fortec team-mate Manuel Maldonado won race two in wet conditions to become the 13th different winner of the season.
However, the South Holland ace was unable to make his way through the field and had to settle for 14th.
With Novalak third, the gap between the two flew up to 50 points ahead of the final race.
At the start of race three, Hoggard lost two places and fell back to fifth – with one of those getting past being chief rival Novalak.
He stayed fifth for the remainder of the race, which was won by Simmons. Crucially, Novalak held on to fourth and extended his lead by a further two points.
