Jaxon Evans has taken some ground out of his teammate Dylan Pereira in his Porsche Mobil 1 Supercup championship challenge by finishing third in round four of the series at the Silverstone Circuit.
The Kiwi was mired behind second-place finisher Max Van Splunteren for the entirety of the 13-lap affair all while eventual race winner Larry Ten Voorde cruised to a commanding victory 11.7-seconds clear of the field.
Pole-sitter Ten Voorde stormed into the distance in the opening few laps as an ailing Van Splunteren was left to fend off a hard-charging Evans.
The exact cause behind Van Splunteren’s sudden drop in performance remained unknown but he quickly established himself as the pilot vehicle of a lengthy train of evidently quicker machinery.
A solid qualifying effort by Evans left the Kiwi to start third on the grid and had the benefit of starting ahead of his BWT Lechner Racing teammate and championship leader Pereira who had a frustrating session to start seventh.
After his DNF in Hungary in the last round, Evans was eager to make amends for his mistake, hounding the rear wing of Van Splunteren who was the cork in the bottle of an eight-car train. The Kiwi was composed in his efforts and spent numerous laps analysing his rival in an attempt to decipher where the best area was to execute a move for the position.
Just behind Evans, Florian Latorre looked to pile the pressure on his rival for the final step of the podium with the laps continuing to count down and the column of drivers queued behind Van Splunteren getting more and more desperate.
Evans showed his nose on several occasions but each opportunity was resisted by the stubborn defence of the Dutch driver.
As the field began its 13th and final lap Evans still found himself stuck in third position, offering a half-hearted dummy into Stowe as his last bid to steal second but ultimately came up shy, finishing a mere four-tenths behind Van Splunteren who completed a Team GP Elite 1-2.
Ten Voorde’s victory is his second of his Porsche Supercup career and the most convincing win of 2020. It also puts an end to the dominance of Evans and Pereira who had claimed wins across all three opening rounds from Austria and Hungary.
An uncharacteristic race by Pereira meant he could only muster sixth after being shoved wide in a failed penultimate lap lunge to steal fifth away from Jaap Van Lagen.
It also means his points lead has taken a sizable blow by Evans as the Supercup field prepares for its second race around Silverstone in just one week.
Further back young Australian Porsche racer Jordan Love was having yet another fine showing in 11th before a late slip-up saw him demoted a place at the line.
The Porsche Supercup field now has reached the mid-point of the condensed 2020 schedule with races from Silverstone, Barcelona, Spa and Monza the only remaining races to be pencilled onto the calendar.