Barwell Motorsport proved the Lamborghini Huracán GT3 Evo2 still has plenty of fight left in it as the team locked out the front row in the final British GT Championship qualifying session of 2025 at Donington Park with Rob Collard & Hugo Cook taking pole. 

Championship leaders Charles Dawson & Kiern Jewiss did their campaign to secure the title no harm at all, they’ll start the race in fourth. 

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Despite a miserable weekend so far, Mahiki Racing had reason to be cheerful as Luke Garlick and Blake Angliss dominated GT4 qualifying, with championship leaders Charlie Robertson and Ravi Ramyead joining them on the front row. 

GT3

The rain that was forecast didn’t make an appearance, but the strong winds from Storm Amy still added a variable contenders had to deal with. 

Being a two-hour race, qualifying was split into two sessions for each category with combined times setting the grid. There was disruption immediately as, in the opening minutes of the first session, Richard Neary ground to a halt at the top of Hollywood with a technical issue in his Team Abba Racing Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo which led to a ten-minute red flag. 

That delay meant the session restarted with just seven minutes left on the clock and an absolute panic to make sure each driver did the two laps needed, as well as making sure one of those laps was fast enough to set a good place on the grid. 

Early on, it was clear to see that Collard was on a charge in the Lamborghini with an early lap of 1m27.123sec putting him up to the top of the times ahead of Darren Leung’s Blackthorn Aston and Andrew Howard’s similar Vantage – the Aston’s doing well in the early session. 

Come the flag coming out, and it was Collard comfortably ahead of the pack, with Dawson moving up to second and Petrobelli third as the title chasers moved toward the head of the field. 

Adding the Pros into the mix just solidified the advantage the Lamborghinis seem to have developed almost by stealth so far this weekend – running well but not spectacularly in the early practice sessions, but coming alive in the afternoon. Cook took over from Collard and was initially at a disadvantage to the sister car Sandy Mitchell took over from Alex Martin and immediately fired to the top on combined times. 

Initially a few tenths behind, Cook’s early flying lap ensured the two Barwell cars were locked on exactly the same time – both on a 2m53.792sec – but as Cook sped up, the advantage started to slowly swing to the side of the garage featuring reigning champion Collard. A late lap pulled the #1 ahead, eventually taking pole by 0.210sec. 

Behind the Lamborghini lock-out, Marcus Clutton grabbed the Orange Racing with JMH McLaren 720S GT3 Evo by the scruff of the neck and powered up to third alongside Matt Topham – a couple of tenths behind Mitchell, but a couple ahead of 2 Seas Motorsport’s Dawson and Jewiss.

The title contenders have given themselves a bit of a gap over their rivals, after a solid yet not quite spectacular session in their Mercedes-AMG GT3, but they’re a row ahead of nearest rivals Giacomo Petrobelli and Jonny Adam who qualified sixth, just behind the Aston of Beechdean’s Howard and Tom Wood – the latter having a great session. 

Seventh is the second 2 Seas car of Kevin Tse and Maxi Götz, the pair not quite where you’d possibly expect them to be considering the performance they’ve put in all season. 

The last of our title contenders – Morgan Tillbrook and Marvin Kirchhöfer – will line up in eighth, just finishing outside the 1sec deficit margin in their Optimum Motorsport McLaren. 

GT4

It’s not been a weekend the Mahiki team will want to look back on in a hurry, but Luke Garlick and Blake Angliss gave the team a reason to be cheerful as they absolutely obliterated the competition in their Ginetta G56 GT4 Evo.

The session went their way from the very start. Garlick elected to go in the first session, and his first lap put him 0.342sec clear of the pack behind. Every lap from there basically solidified his grip on pole before the second session was even needed as he dropped down to a 1m33.961sec to hand over to Angliss with a 0.627sec lead over Optimum Motorsport’s Harry George. Crucially, though, Ravi Ramyead pulled the Century Motorsport BMW M4 GT4 to a magnificent third – less than a tenth down on George. 

Come the Pro session and it was an easy run to the pole for Angliss who picked up where Garlick left off and actually went even faster than his co-driver as he set a 1m33.878sec to log a combined time of 3m07.839sec. 

That was 0.845sec ahead of eventual neighbours on the front-row, Ramyead and Robertson. The latter was flying in his session even with the wind buffeting him around the undulating Donington Park circuit. While he couldn’t get the time needed to snatch overall pole, he was comfortably on Pro-Am pole by almost half-a-second. 

His vanquished foe was Seb Morris, who seems to find another level every time he gets behind the wheel of the Team Parker Racing Mercedes-AMG GT4 to take Ed McDermott’s respectable seventh fastest time and powered to third – 0.037sec ahead of George and Luca Hopkinson. 

Three points behind in the championship is Marc Warren and Jack Brown, and they gave themselves a slightly harder task as they’ll be starting mid-pack having qualified their Optimum McLaren Artura in fifth. 

Sixth went to the second Century BMW of Brandon Templeton and Chris Salkeld, while Owen Hizzey powered MKH Racing to seventh alongside Michael Orant. Phil Keen and Jon Currie struggled somewhat on their return to the championship in the GT4 Endurance Cup, as they took eighth, ahead of Jolt Racing’s John Ingram and Rupert Williams.

The #DoningtonDecider takes place tomorrow, Sunday 5 October, at 1.15pm UK time, 2.15pm in Europe. You’ll be able to follow the race live on GT REPORT!