James Higgins clinched a trio of hard-fought points finishes last weekend (June 24/25) as the ROKiT F4 British Championship certified by FIA took centre stage on the world-famous Silverstone Grand Prix circuit.
One week on from scoring victory in the series’ historic 250th race, the Fortec Motorsport driver produced a gritty performance in Northamptonshire to walk away with two top-ten charges and a flurry of overtakes in the reverse grid contest.
Qualifying on Saturday morning proved to be a captivating affair as a number of drivers – one of which was Higgins – traded fastest times around the 3.66-mile circuit. Featuring towards the summit of the timesheets throughout, Higgins ultimately ended up fifth as the clock ticked to zero.
With the second fastest times from qualifying deciding the grid order for the weekend’s opening race, the 17-year-old found himself towards the sharp end of the grid as the lights went out and that would be where he would remain throughout the 20-minute bout.
Slotting into fifth on lap one, the Goblin EV-backed driver comfortably held station before a late time penalty for Deagen Fairclough in front promoted Higgins up to fourth as he took the chequered flag.
Starting Sunday’s reverse grid contest towards the rear of the field in 17th, the teenage racer battled the ever-increasing temperatures to make a number of impressive moves up the order and finish just shy of the top ten in 11th.
Higgins then rounded out his weekend at the Home of British Motor Racing with another notable drive to eighth.
Blasting his way up to fourth during the opening sequence of corners, the former karting talent soon found himself on the unfortunate end of some slip stream manoeuvres later around the lap which dropped him back to eighth.
Valiantly battling to fight his way back up the order by showcasing plenty of eye-catching pace, Higgins was unable to progress any further and enjoyed a relatively trouble-free run to the finish.
As the ROKiT F4 British Championship certified by FIA heads into its annual summer break, Higgins sits sixth in the Drivers’ Championship and firmly within striking distance of the standings summit with four events still to run.
James Higgins: “Overall it’s been a pretty solid weekend. Of course it would have been nice to be up on the podium again but given how difficult it was to overtake at times I think we can be happy that we maximised everything as best we could.
“In what has been a constant theme of our season, we struggled with the starts but once we were up and running the pace of the car felt good. I enjoyed getting stuck in and had some mega side-by-side battles too; I’m taking plenty of positives – and some points – away from this one.
“We’ve now got break of about a month until we’re back racing at Croft so we’ll hit the reset button, see what improvements we can make – both individually and as a team – and then we’ll try hit the ground running for the remainder of the season.”
The ROKiT F4 British Championship certified by FIA resumes on July 29/30 with Rounds 19, 20 & 21 taking place at Croft Circuit in North Yorkshire.
