Harry Hickton will become the latest Cooper champion to move into the headline class of the Vertu MINI CHALLENGE after confirming his graduation into the JCW category for 2025.<\/strong><\/p>\nHickton picked up the Cooper title in dramatic fashion during the 2024 season finale at Brands Hatch, where he saw off the challenge of team-mate Sam Gornall to lift the championship crown by just by just two points.<\/p>\n
It capped a fine campaign for the 18-year-old, who scored five wins and ten podiums in total from 21 races. Those podium finishes included arguably the drive of the season at Donington Park, where Hickton battled back from issues in qualifying to come from 20th on the grid to take third in the final race of the weekend.<\/p>\n
Hickton, who previously raced in the Junior Saloon Car Championship, had made no secret of his desire to follow the likes of Dominic Wheatley, Nelson King and Tom Ovenden in stepping up into the JCW class, which led to a toe-in-the-water outing in the final round of the 2024 campaign.<\/p>\n
Stepping into the car that had carried Dan Zelos to a third championship title, Hickton showed impressive pace on his JCW debut when – despite limited track time – he was able to pick up a best finish of sixth against drivers who had been competing in the cars all season.<\/p>\n
Hickton\u2019s full-time move up into the JCW class will see him work alongside father David – an accomplished driver himself in historic racing – in order to prepare the car, with assistance on race weekends coming from the Mannpower Motorsport team.<\/p>\n
The team will be makings its debut in the JCW class this season after years of competing in the Cooper category, with Hickton\u2019s car being one of two running under the Mannpower Motorsport name in 2025.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m super excited about making the move up into the JCW class this season,\u201d Hickton said. \u201cWinning the MINI CHALLENGE Trophy last year was a fantastic achievement, and when you then add in how well my outing in the JCW car went, it leaves me feeling confident about the year ahead.<\/em><\/p>\n\u201cI\u2019m looking forward to getting down to business at round one, and there is no reason why we shouldn\u2019t be consistently battling towards the front of the grid and fighting hard for some top results from the start.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\nMannpower Motorsport team boss James Manning said his was looking forward to working with Hickton when he makes the full-time step up in class for the new season.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are very excited to be welcoming Harry into the team as we embark on our first season competing in the JCW class,\u201d he said. \u201cHe was hugely impressive in the MINI CHALLENGE Trophy last season, and we are looking forward to working together to maintain the success he enjoyed in 2024 in another highly-competitive class.<\/em><\/p>\n\u201cWorking with Harry is the first stage of our JCW plans for this season, with more news still to come before the opening rounds at Donington Park.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n[\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][et_pb_column type=”1_2″ _builder_version=”4.16″ background_enable_image=”off” background_size=”contain” background_position=”center_left” custom_padding=”|||” global_colors_info=”{}” custom_padding__hover=”|||”][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/www.minichallenge.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/HH2.jpg” title_text=”HH2″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/www.minichallenge.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/03\/HH1.jpg” title_text=”HH1″ _builder_version=”4.27.4″ global_colors_info=”{}”][\/et_pb_image][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Harry Hickton will become the latest Cooper class champion to move into the headline class of the Vertu MINI CHALLENGE after confirming his graduation into the JCW category for 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":27487,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1462,1465],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27484","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","category-jcw"],"yoast_head":"\n
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