Photo by Gary Hawkins
Formula Ford 1600 star Jason Smyth is the highest-placed improver in the Ryan Motorsport Insurance Autosport National Rankings this week after bagging another victory at Brands Hatch.
The Van Diemen RF00/JL12 pilot has achieved success in the Northern Irish championship this year but has now climbed to seventh in the winners' table after prevailing in the opening United FF1600 contest in Kent.
Smyth was on course to win the second race, too, until his engine suddenly cut out without warning on the penultimate lap.
His earlier victory took his tally for the year to 10 and sends him up from ninth on the leaderboard, but he would have climbed to third and be just two wins behind table-topper Stewart Black had he been able to seal the double.
Smyth is two places above another of this week's improvers, Irishman Michael Cullen - who topped the final rankings last year.
The veteran racer enjoyed a successful weekend on less familiar territory as the Irish categories had an away round at Anglesey.
Cullen again topped both Stryker bouts at the Welsh venue and also prevailed in one of the Irish Fiesta ST contests (when the cars shared a grid with their Scottish cousins), but missed out on a quadruple success as he was pipped by his son Victor by less than a second in the opener.
Nevertheless, Cullen has still soared 14 places up the leaderboard as he has now registered 10 victories this year and his attention will have turned to matching last year's glory.
David Russell enjoyed a brilliant weekend at Snetterton to move into 19th
Photo by: Richard Styles
Completing the changes inside the top 10 is Ben Timmons, the Caterham 270R racer taking a brace of triumphs at Knockhill.
However, he was another driver to narrowly fail to clinch a clean sweep after finishing third - albeit three tenths behind the winner - in the middle encounter.
Timmons' other successes still enable him to leap up eight places and into 10th.
Further back, two unbeaten Armed Forces Race Challenge class winners topped further battles at Snetterton.
Class D pacesetter Douglas Inglis added two more wins in his Mazda MX-5 in Norfolk, to jump 30 places up the leaderboard and into 18th.
He is one spot above the similarly dominant David Russell (BMW E36), who has had a slightly lower number of average starters in Class C this year.
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All car races in UK and Ireland are included except qualification/repechage, consolation and handicap races. No races in other countries.
Class wins are only counted when there are at least six starters in the class, except: when the race is part of a multi-stage event where six or more have taken part in earlier heats that feed into a semi-final or final; when multiple championships are merged in the same race, the ‘overall’ winner from the slower championship can count a class win as long as that championship has at least 10 starters across all classes. Only classes divided by car characteristics are included, not those divided by driver characteristics such as ability, professional status, age, experience (for example rookie or Pro-Am classes).
Each race counts only once, so an overall winner’s class win is not added. Where there is a tie, overall wins take precedence. Where there is still a tie, average grid size for a driver’s wins determines the order.
Source: Autosport