+ Barnicoat’s fastest time not enough to deny Paradine’s BMW
+ GT4 pole on debut for Innovation and Simpson
+ Results: Silverstone 500 Qualifying
Paradine Competition, Darren Leung and Dan Harper picked up where they left off at Silverstone 12 months ago by claiming pole position for British GT’s three-hour showpiece, while Thomas Holland and Hadley Simpson topped GT4 qualifying on Innovation Racing’s series debut.
Last year’s winners are unbeaten as a pairing at the 500 and will start as favourites tomorrow when they attempt to claim a record third victory together. Their BMW shares the front row with Optimum’s Morgan Tillbrook and Ben Barnicoat who set fastest time in Q2 – 1m57.214s – to limit Paradine’s combined advantage to 0.638s.
Jarrod Waberski impressed by setting Q2’s second fastest lap, which gave the Barwell Lamborghini he shares with Alex Martin Silver-Am pole and fifth overall.
In GT4, Holland’s heavy lifting in Q1 earned Innovation’s Ginetta a 0.9s advantage over the chasing pack. And the team needed almost all of it to secure P1 when Jack Mitchell’s banzai Q2 time reduced the combined deficit to just 0.032s. The Toro Verde G56 he shares with Luke Shaw was, nevertheless, best placed of the Pro-Am contenders.
GT3: PARADINE PRIMED FOR 500 REPEAT
As one-off entrants, Leung and Harper will not score points on Sunday. But they underlined their status as one of the pre-race favourites by achieving something they’d failed to do during either their 2023 championship-winning campaign or subsequent guest appearances: secure pole position on merit.
Paradine’s BMW was untouchable in the first 10-minute session when Leung set consecutive fastest times. Reigning champion Charles Dawson trimmed the advantage on his final flyer but still ended up 0.8s down on the M4, while Rob Collard and Tillbrook finished roughly one second behind the M4. GT3 debutant Marc Warren was fifth in Optimum’s second McLaren but fastest of the Silver-Am entries, and Kevin Tse’s 2 Seas Mercedes-AMG completed the initial top six.
Q2 was far more interesting, at least from the perspective of an isolated session. The impressive Waberski twice set fastest individual time before Barnicoat lowered the benchmark to a 1m57.214s, which moved Optimum’s McLaren up two places in the combined classification.
Harper was also briefly quickest of all before slipping to third. But it mattered little to the outcome.
Hugo Cook and Collard remained third overall in the first of Barwell’s Lamborghinis. They’ll line up alongside reigning champions Dawson and Kiern Jewiss who beat 2 Seas team-mates Tse and Ben Green to fourth.
Martin and Waberski completed the overall top six ahead of three McLarens: Orange/JMH plus Optimum’s #90 and #3 720S GT3s. Beechdean AMR start 10th.
GT4: INNOVATION LEADS GINETTA’S FRONT ROW LOCKOUT
Holland and Simpson combined to great effect to score the first GT4 pole position of the season for Ginetta, which also starts second thanks to Toro Verde.
The Leeds marque enjoyed something of a purple patch on Saturdays toward the end of last year by securing the final three GT4 poles of 2025. And Innovation ensured that would become four in a row, with Holland setting up the result over the first half of qualifying.
His Q1 best put the #74 out front by 0.880s after pulling clear of Josh Stanton in the Optimum Motorsport McLaren and Shaw aboard Toro Verde’s Ginetta. That gave Simpson a handy gap to defend in Q2, but he was made to work for it thanks to Mitchell’s efforts.
The 2018 champion and former 500 winner initially sliced six tenths from Holland’s time but was significantly faster than Simpson who remained on used tyres. The upshot was a reduced gap of three hundredths – enough, nevertheless, for Innovation to start P1 on debut.
Will Orton and Jessica Hawkins line up third in MK Racing’s Aston Martin Vantage, with Daniel Lavery and Darren Turner’s Grange Racing by FSR version fourth. Stanton and Luca Hopkinson were the top McLaren in fifth for Optimum, ahead of Branden Templeton and Jack Collins in Century Motorsport’s BMW.
The Silverstone 500 goes green at 13:00 on Sunday. Watch it live on Sky Sports F1 as well as SRO’s GT World YouTube channel and official app.
