Optimum Motorsport focused on maximising British GT4 results at Snetterton

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The ultimate goal may be to win the 2016 Pirelli British GT Championship GT4 crown, but Optimum Motorsport is putting its title ambitions to the back of its mind entering the penultimate round of the season at Snetterton (6-7 August).

Optimum Motorsport can now focus all of its energy on its GT4 bid in the final two rounds of 2016 after withdrawing its Audi R8 LMS GT3 from the championship for being unable to achieve desired results because of restrictions and weight penalties associated with fielding an all-silver graded driver pairing.

Graham Johnson and Mike Robinson finished runner-up in the 2015 GT4 classification and they hold the initiative as the British GT Championship returns from Belgium to UK shores and Snetterton in the East Anglian countryside.

The teammates raced their PMW World Expo Ginetta G55 to race wins at Brands Hatch’s season-opener and Oulton Park and then returned to the podium last time out at Belgium’s Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps, having retired from preceding rounds at Rockingham and Silverstone.

Snetterton’s 2.99mile ‘300’ configuration features long straights that favour cars with large capacity engines and high top speeds and a tight infield that lends itself to smaller, more agile machinery.

However, Optimum Motorsport has been rapid in pre and in-season testing and there’s an air of confidence within the team, even though Johnson and Robinson may be compromised by a seven-second success penalty in the first of two races this weekend.

Optimum Motorsport Team Principal, Shaun Goff, said: “Wrapping up the GT4 title is possible at Snetterton, but we’re putting that to the back of our minds and focusing on achieving strong results in both races, aware that we’ll be compromised by a success penalty. There will be small thoughts of the title ticking away in the background, but we can’t get too drawn to that because you open yourself up to mistakes by pushing too hard. We’ll be there or thereabouts.”

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