Panda Racing IN:MINI’s Hamish Brandon will be looking to ride a wave of momentum into the penultimate round of the 2015 Power Maxed MINI Challenge season at the East Midland’s Donington Park this weekend (19-20 September) and pile the pressure on the championship leader.
The Hawick, Scotland-based racer has grown up in the MINI paddock in various championships around the UK and is now into his second season of the R56 category, where he notched up his third win of the season last time out at Cheshire’s picturesque Oulton Park to further cement his second position in the Drivers’ standings.
With the title now Neil Newstead’s to lose, Brandon is focused entirely on racking up as many race wins and podiums in the remainder of the season and heads to Donington Park in a buoyant frame of mind, after opening his 2015 account with a hat-trick of podiums in the East Midlands.
Running on the 2.48mile Grand Prix configuration, drivers will be tackling the fast sweeping Fogarty Esses followed by a sprint towards the tight Melbourne hairpin, where a test of the late-breakers will either move them up the leaderboard or into the pits with damage.
“We have nothing to lose this weekend, so we are heading into it looking to fight for more wins,” said Brandon. “The car felt really strong at Oulton Park, so we haven’t changed anything on it and we’ll see where we end up. I really enjoy racing at Donington Park, as it’s a fast circuit where you have to keep the momentum all the way round and it’s where we opened our account with a hat-trick of podiums, including a win, so it would be good to replicate that again and come away with more wins to add to my tally.
“The championship leader needs a bad weekend for us to catch him in the points, but he has one hand already on the trophy, so it’s certainly his to lose. We’re no longer focused on the championship standings and are instead focused purely going out there to have some fun and come away with some wins.”
Qualifying for the penultimate meeting of the 2015 Power Maxed MINI Challenge season is scheduled for 17.10 on Saturday (19 September), with the weekend’s two races taking place the following day (20 September) at 10.30 and 16.30 respectively.
For more information on Panda Racing and Hamish Brandon, please visit the official www.hamishbrandon.com website, ‘like’ the Facebook page or follow @PandaRacingTeam on Twitter.