BLAKE Angliss charged from the back of the grid to claim a podium finish at Brands Hatch in the British GT Championship.
The Coventry driver finished second in class in the penultimate round of the season in his third outing for Mahiki Racing.
Angliss raced with experienced Ginetta driver and British GT podium finisher Luke Garlick in the silver category for the first time.
Angliss said: “After cruelly missing out on the podium last time out at Snetterton, it’s a huge relief to pick up our first silverware of the season.
“The team have worked incredibly hard with the new cars over the last few events and it’s great to reward their efforts with a podium.
“We knew it would be a challenging weekend, heading in with no pre-event testing in the Ginetta.
“We made good progress through free practice though, which made the puncture even more frustrating in qualifying as we had the speed to finish in the top four at least.
“Credit to Luke, he’s come in and done a good job. He made great progress at the start of the race and handed the car over in a strong position.
“Therefore, it was gutting to receive the pit stop penalty, as without it we certainly had the pace to finish in the overall top three in GT4.
“I’m happy with the pace I showed in my stint, matching lap times of the front-running cars and pulling off some overtaking moves.
“Overall, we made a step forward this weekend and hopefully we can progress further and enjoy a successful end to the season at Donington Park.”
Angliss got behind the wheel of the Ginetta G56 GT4 Evo in free practice sessions with no pre-event testing possible.
However, Angliss and Garlick endured a nightmare qualifying session after suffering a puncture which sent the car spinning into the gravel trap and out of the session.
That meant the pair had to start the two-hour race from the back of the GT4 grid with Garlick behind the wheel for the opening 35-minute stint.
Garlick made quick progress to move up to second in the GT4 classification despite a couple of safety car periods.
The mid-race pit stop saw Angliss take over as the 22-year-old created a big gap to the car behind.
However, Angliss and Garlick received a drive-through penalty for a pit stop infringement to deny the pair an overall top-three finish.
Another safety car period followed as Angliss maintained second place in the silver class to earn the second British GT podium finish of his career.
