McLaren machinery topped the opening British GT Championship session of the weekend with Marcus Clutton’s time of 1m23.663s enough to lead the way in Free Practice on the Brands Hatch Grand Prix circuit this morning (Saturday).

Clutton’s best effort came on just the fourth of 34 flying laps during the one-hour session in bright and sunny conditions. That was enough to place the Orange Racing by JMH 720S GT3 Evo he shared with Simon Orange 0.274s clear on the Kent circuit’s longer layout.

The next quickest car was the first of Barwell Motorsport’s two Lamborghinis, that of Alex Martin and Patrick Kujala, with the latter setting the car’s best time. There was a slightly larger gap back to the third-placed car with Giacomo Petrobelli and Jonny Adam over seven tenths off Clutton’s pace in third, but only a thousandth ahead of the fourth-placed Team Parker Racing Porsche of Nick Jones and Sven Muller.

Barwell Motorsport’s second entry rounded out the top-five with Hugo Cook posting the quicker effort alongside co-driver Rob Collard. The Optimum Motorsport McLaren of Morgan Tillbrook and Marvin Kirchhöfer was the last of the cars lapping within a second of the leading pace in sixth.

Behind that, the 2 Seas Motorsport Merceses-AMG of Kevin Tse and Maximilian Götz was seventh ahead of two McLarens. Optimum Motorsport’s second example was eighth with Jon Kearney and Callum Macleod at the wheel whilst Martin Plowman and Mark Smith were ninth for Paddock Motorsport.

The top-10 was completed by Beechdean Motorsport’s Aston Martin, piloted by Andrew Howard and Tom Wood.

British GT Championship, Free Practice, Brands Hatch

1. Orange/Clutton, Orange Racing by JMH, McLaren 720S GT3 Evo, 1m23.663s
2. Martin/Kujala, Lamborghini Huracan GT3 Evo2, +0.274s
3. Petrobelli/Adam, Blackthorn, Aston Martin Vantage AMR GT3 Evo, +0.740s
4. Jones/Muller, Team Parker Racing, Porsche 911 GT3 R, +0.741s
5. Collard/Cook, Barwell Motorsport, Lamborghini Huracan GT3 Evo2, +0.901s
6. Tillbrook/Kirchhöfer, Optimum Motorsport, McLaren 720S GT3 Evo, +0.935s
7. Tse/Götz, 2 Seas Motorsport, Mercedes-AMG GT3 Evo, +1.030s
8. Kearney/Macleod, Optimum Motorsport, McLaren 720S GT3 Evo, +1.037s
9. Smith/Plowman, Paddock Motorsport, McLaren 720S GT3 Evo, +1.293s
10. Howard/Wood, Beechdean Motorsport, Aston Martin Vantage AMR GT3 Evo, +1.434s

Click here for the full times from this race event.