Paddock Motorsport put in a fighting performance during the British GT Championship season-opener at Donington Park last weekend, with Mark Smith and Martin Plowman defying a worsening mechanical issue to secure a decent haul of points. A deteriorating differential across the final half of the two-hour race, allied to being boxed-in during their pit stop limited what could have been a top-six performance for the crew. However, Paddock’s #9 McLaren still showed bags of potential across the event, which puts the team in a strong position going forward. With the entire Donington weekend taking place under glorious spring sunshine, Paddock set about honing the 720S GT3 Evo’s setup to the 2.5-mile Grand Prix circuit. After racking up some useful mileage during Practice, there was a setback when Smith slipped into the gravel during Pre-Qualifying picking up some splitter and floor damage that would need to be repaired. Despite the lost running, the team went into Qualifying in confident mood, with Smith putting in a great effort during his run to slot the McLaren into seventh overall. Plowman then backed up the hard work to ensure Paddock would start Sunday’s race from ninth overall. In fact, the margins were so fine that one extra tenth would have put the crew sixth in the grid instead. Smith took the wheel for the start and immediately looked to make progress. However, his Pirelli tyres took longer than expected to find their bite, leaving him embroiled in a thrilling four-car duel with the #3 Optimum McLaren, #66 Team Parker Racing Porsche and #1 Barwell Motorsport Lamborghini. Despite briefly dropping to the tail of this pack, Smith put on a great show as he gradually worked his way back through as the McLaren came into its performance window. A brave pass on the Optimum McLaren – which included some door banging and Smith running with two wheels on the grass at one point – was a real highlight. Having gained back the positions, Smith settled into seventh right before the race was neutralised to clear a Lotus that had been shoved into the gravel. The resulting safety car bunched the pack and put Smith on the tail of the Team Abba Mercedes when the pit window opened and he dived in to hand to Plowman. This was where the first misfortune struck as the Paddock McLaren was blocked in the tight pit lane, with the resulting delay to work the car free costing the crew around 24 seconds. Plowman rejoined in ninth and had just got up to speed when the car’s handling began to suffer due to a suspected differential issue. Despite the issues, Plowman soldiered on and successfully held off the #3 McLaren to take the flag in position. However, the team was elevated a further place following the exclusion of the #67 McLaren for a parc ferme infringement, leaving Smith and Plowman firmly in the points-paying places in eighth overall and seventh of the Pro-Am runners. Mark Smith said: “It’s a bit of a disappointing result because we definitely could have had more. We felt we had a quick car, but for the first few laps I didn’t have much grip so perhaps we went out with pressures that were a little optimistic. That put me into the pack and cost me a few spots and then I had to make my way back through, which was fun but a lot of effort. A few drivers really had their elbows out, but I was determined to make the moves count. Things were looking good until I started to feel the diff toward the end of my stint, and then we got delayed in our pit and lost a chunk of time. I know the problem then held Martin back quite badly, so we’ll investigate that and get back at it for Silverstone.” Martin Plowman said: “As season-openers go, it wasn’t the smoothest for us, but we have a lot of positives to take from it. Mark drove brilliantly during his opening stint and pulled off some excellent passing moves, which shows he’s full of confidence, and the entire technical team worked really well all weekend. The race was looking positive for us before the pit delay, and then when I got into the car the rear was gradually getting looser and looser, so I was hanging on to an extent. Considering that, to come away with some decent points is always a plus. We’ll get back to base, strip the differential and gearbox down and come back fighting at Silverstone at the end of the month.” Paddock Motorsport is next in action for the biggest race of the British GT season, the Silverstone 500, across the weekend of April 25-27.