Oliver Clarke's latest trip to contest the United States Formula 4 Championship proved challenging for the Downham Market 16-year-old, with a best result of 10th place.
"It has been a tough weekend," reflected Clarke. "One top-10 finish is frustrating, but we are well aware of how competitive this championship is."
The teenager took part in the two-day test prior to the Pittsburgh International Raceway round, but was unable to post better than 15th fastest lap time during the qualifying session.
A demon start to race one saw Clarke make progress and he quickly latched on to the battle for seventh place, but despite several attempts to make further progress he took the chequered flag in 10th.
Clarke started race two from the same position, but a difficult race saw him finish a lap down at the end.
From 14th on the grid for race three Clarke duelled with Josh Bethune and Guilherme Peixoto, but narrowly missed out on another top-10 finish, by just one position.
"I don't think we are too far away from that breakthrough result," he said. "We've just got to keep working hard as a team, make progress and I'm sure it will come."
Pole position, fastest race lap and a hard-fought victory at Brands Hatch has elevated Attleborough's Jeremy Clark into second place in the Historic 70s Road Sports Championship.
Reigning title holder Clark, who has to make up for non-starting the opening round due to an engine oil leak, saw rival Jim Dean blast past his Lotus Elan with his Lotus Europa at the start of the race.
"It's a longer race today so I just waited and watched," said Clark, who flew by the race leader when a gearbox problem struck the Europa but had to fend off Will Leverett's Europa before taking the chequered flag.
After burning the midnight oil repairing the engine in his Ferrari 308 GTB, John Dickson just made it to the Kent track but suffered a water leak from the head gasket in qualifying.
Undeterred, the Rickinghall racer attempted a quick fix in the paddock which failed shortly after the start of the race.
"I had to try," said Dickson on his efforts to make the race.
Glenn Eagling's fantastic run of results with his Historic Formula Two Griston-built GRD 273 came to an end at Brands Hatch when a suspected valve problem locked up the engine just as the Dereham racer was in a podium place.
Fans of the British Touring Car Championship will be able to get a preview of the Snetterton round, to be held over the weekend of August 3-4, next Tuesday and Wednesday when the series conducts a mid-season tyre test at the Norfolk venue with free admission.
Currently the new-for-2019 BMW 330i M Sport, produced by West Surrey Racing, is the car to beat, having clocked up nine wins from 15 races in the hands of reigning champion Colin Turkington and former title holder Andrew Jordan.
Giving chase are the Honda Civic-mounted Josh Cook and Rory Butcher plus the Subaru Levorg of Ash Sutton, who will all be hoping to close the gap when the series returns to race at Snetterton in August.
Meanwhile, the locally-based EXCELR8 Motorsport will be flat out readying their pair of MG6s which were heavily damaged at the previous round in the hands of Rob Smith and Sam Osborne.
Christopher Wesemael lost his unbeaten RGB record on Saturday at Snetterton when Danny Andrew passed him mid-way through the first race to inflict his first defeat of the season. Retirement from race two gave Andrew an easy run to his second victory.
Having taken the lead of the opening Toyota MR2 on lap three, Bury St Edmunds racer Shaun Traynor sailed off into the distance while in the second race he had to settle for fourth place.
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