George King made a strong start to his second Ligier European Series (LES) campaign, claiming a brace of podium finishes in the opening round at Barcelona's Circuit de Catalunya.
Still fresh from a debut win in the Ultimate Cup Series with the same Team Virage operation four weeks ago, the Briton was back in the cockpit of a Ligier JSP4 for the first time since clinching third overall in the 2022 LES standings, now partnering Portugal's Bernardo Pinheiro in the #60 machine.
With Barcelona returning to the schedule for the first time since 2020, it was King's first appearance at the Spanish Grand Prix venue, but the 22-year-old adapted quickly, topping the timesheets for the majority of the opening practice session, before his co-driver led the way in FP2 to hint at the combination's potential ahead of qualifying. Despite missing out on valuable track time in that second session, King then claimed third on the grid for race one, lapping three-tenths off the pole position time and just a tenth from a spot on the front row, while Pinheiro produced a stellar lap in his qualifying session to annex P2 for the second race, trailing the sister Virage car by a miniscule 0.007secs to underline just how competitive the season could be.
"Topping the timesheet in the first session — before the sister car annoyingly pipped me by six-hundredths on its last lap — was extremely promising," King admitted. "Knowing that we were already up at the front that early in the meeting, especially with Bernardo topping FP2, gave us mega confidence for qualifying. Unfortunately, Bernardo also suffered some damage in the session and, with that taking time to fix, I missed out on extra track time before qualifying. With that in mind, I was happy to put the car into P3 — even though, looking through data after the session, I found I was losing time in one particular corner, without which I would’ve had the pace for pole!"
The opening race of the season kicked off Saturday's proceedings, getting underway at 9am with the front of the field holding station through the first corner, as King engaged in an early scrap with Simone Riccitelli. Having established a gap over the Italian, however, the Team Virage driver was able to close quickly on second place, eventually grabbing the position under braking before again pulling away and setting the fastest lap of the race (1min 45.253secs) before handing over to Pinheiro at the mandatory pit-stop. The Portuguese driver could do nothing about the sister Virage car out front though, eventually taking the chequered flag two seconds adrift.
"I made a mega start, but there was no way around the front two into T1," King recounted. "After a few laps defending from Simone, I made the move for P2 and started to hunt down my team-mate for P1, gapping the cars behind and setting the fastest lap of the race during the chase. Although I got to within three-tenths of the lead, and was trying to force a mistake, we then started to catch lapped traffic, which cost us a few seconds just before the pit-stop. Bernardo jumped in and got the gap down again, but there wasn't enough time to have a scrap for P1."
Having secured his best LES finish to date, King had to wait until the second stint of race two before getting back into the #60, and found the car a very different prospect just four hours after the end of the opening event. Taking over in P1 after Pinheiro's run, the Briton suffered with unexpected understeer, making it impossible to defend his lead.
"I came out P1 but, whether it was due to the tyres or track temperature, I just couldn't defend," King lamented. "My team-mate, being a single driver entry, was already warmed up and comfortable after half an hour of driving, whereas it took me a few laps to adapt to how the car was feeling. I tried my best to defend from him, but it wasn’t enough, even though, after a couple of laps of learning how the car now handled, I was fastest on track again. I brought the gap down rapidly to P1 but, yet again, traffic and time got in the way of what could have been!
"Despite that, I'm really happy with my first weekend back in the JSP4. I went in there with little expectation, but I knew I wanted more than last year and that’s exactly what I got. I'm happy with two solid P2s to start the season, and Virage got a 1-2 in both races, so it's been an amazing day for the team — especially as they also won the Michelin Le Mans Cup race!
"I'm buzzing for the next round at Le Mans but there is other business to take care this weekend as I’m back in the LMP3 at Navarra..."
King's next outing in the Ligier European Series comes at the Circuit de la Sarthe in Le Mans next month, following round two of the Ultimate Cup Series at Navarra, in Spain, this weekend (28-30 April).
