Now Driver of the Year Turkington sets sights onarecordfifthcrown
COLIN Turkington, who was named Britain’s National Racing Driver of the Year at the weekend, has confirmed he will stay with BMW as he bids for an alltime record of five British Touring Car titles in 2020.
On a night when he shared the stage at the prestigious Autosport Awards in London with world champions Lewis Hamilton and Ott Tanak, Turkington topped the poll in the National Driver category, beating off competition which included his fellow Ulsterman Daniel Harper, the teenage GB Porsche Carrera Cup champion.
Immediately afterwards he announced he will stay with manufacturers’ champions BMW and West Surrey Racing next season in a bid to retain the BTCC title he won in a dramatic finale at Brands Hatch back in October, equalling Andy Rouse as a fourtime champion.
Now he has his sights set on becoming the most successful BTCC driver of all time.
“Going into 2020 with Team BMW will mark my 16th season in the BTCC and remaining with BMW and the West Surrey team was never in doubt and we are excited to be defending our titles together,” said the Portadown man who picked up another honour yesterday with the award of the Fairfield Trophy from the British Racing Drivers’ Club for his Outstanding Achievements, at a lunch where Harper collected the Surtees Trophy for his performances as a Rising Star.
Turkington added: “Becoming a four-time BTCC champion was a special moment, but I am motivated to keep striving for more. Racing with this team gives me the best chance to achieve further success, and I’m so thankful to both BMW and WSR for these opportunities.
“The level of competition in this series keeps me inspired and I’m as hungry as ever to further develop the BMW 3 Series and push the limits of performance as far as we can. We had very little testing this season outside of the races so I’m looking forward to starting a thorough programme in the New Year.
“The consistency of the car and personnel is a great boost and further motivates me as we get to see what the potential of this car actually is. There was a lot of ‘new’ to contend with in 2019 in terms of the car and my engineer, so familiarity of environment should only enhance things.”
Turkington, who is now based in England, was back home on Friday night to receive an Outstanding Achievement award from his local peers at the Celebration of Motorsport dinner in the Culloden Hotel, an event which raised over £75,000 for Action Medical Research NI.
FEWER than 48 hours had passed since the win over Harlequins when Ulster’s squad reassembled yesterday for the coming weekend’s reverse fixture.
A game won only by virtue of a 79th-minute penalty by John Cooney, head coach Dan McFarland had allowed a measure of frustration to seep into his post-match comments, admitting his side had to ensure they were demonstrably better before facing the same opposition on Friday night (7.45pm kick-off) in London.
The margins in Champions Cup rugby are finer than ever. While Ulster were thankful for the needless late penalty conceded by their visitors, the nine-point deficit they’d had to overcome was the product of a fine intercept from Alex Dombrandt on the try-line that essentially provided a twoscore swing.
McFarland is therefore wise to focus upon the process rather than outcome despite the stark contrast between the celebrations in the stands and the tone of the coach’s box.
Player descriptions of yesterday’s video review ranged from “interesting” to “harsh” which drew a chuckle from the coaching team’s forwards specialist Roddy Grant (right).
“Players will always say that while coaches will say it was frank,” he laughed. “It’s important to highlight things that didn’t go well, especially in this unique situation when you play the same team again this week.
“Things that didn’t go well, you definitely have to get right this week because it’s not like you play another team and you might get away with it (again). If things didn’t go well they’re not going to go well again unless you fix them obviously as it’s the same opposition.
“There are certain areas of the game where we need to be a lot better and I guess those are the things that were maybe harsh. Harsh but true.
“Regardless of the result, if action or performance standards weren’t good they need to be highlighted and go pretty hard at.
“After a win it makes it easier because you can always have the harsher things balanced with the positive message.
“If something didn’t go that well or there were things you weren’t that happy with they have to be said and if there are positive things to put with it you can add them in.”
Sure to have been the focus of Grant’s attention during a second scrutiny of the tape will have been the breakdown.
With former England captain
Chris Robshaw especially prominent at ruck time, the number of turnovers are a puzzle that requires solving. “There was a lot of really good stuff but there were six breakdown turnovers that came,” Grant reflected. “It was individual errors which was the frustrating thing that we were off the pace or we were there too slowly, we were stripped in contact.