RACING LIFE IN LOCKDOWN

You won’t believe who Aston racer Darren Turner has sold sims to

ernando Alonso fired me off into the wall at Indianapolis.” If that sounds alarming, never fear: Darren Turner is only talking ‘virtually’. Like many of his friends and contemporaries, the 46-year-old Aston Martin Racing GTE driver has used esports to keep his hand in during lockdown and has enjoyed sparring with such luminaries, but he is now revving up for a return to real-world racing – plus an exciting new test and development role for the British Touring Car Championship.

Turner raced in the BTCC in 2006-2008, winning five races for Seat, before Le Mans and sports car racing with Aston became his main focus. Now he is returning to the BTCC, not to race but to develop the series’ new hybrid system, due to become mandatory in 2022. The intensive test programme begins this week, with Turner driving at Snetterton for two days in a Speedworks

Motorsport Toyota Corolla fitted with the new Cosworth Electronics system.

“The plan is for this to enhance the show, with more scope for overtaking and also to be used in defensive mode too, to add a bit more strategy.”

The initial plan is for hybrid power to be available for use after the first lap, but the specifics of deployment have yet to be pinned down. That will be part of Turner’s job. “Spectators will be able to know the driver has engaged the hybrid, as will competitors,” he says. “It should mean another level of interest. It’s another weapon in the drivers’ racing armoury.” to a driver with increasingly extensive knowledge of such work out on the road with Aston Martin, in everything from the Valkyrie to the new DBX SUV. “I’m involved in most of the products coming out of Gaydon, under [Aston Martin chief engineer] Matt Becker,” he says.

“On the Valkyrie, Chris Goodwin is the lead test driver. It makes me realise how simple race car development is in comparison. There’s one objective with a race car: to be fast, reliable and win races. That’s pretty much it. Road car development has got everything: all the things we go through and take for granted on the road have to be tested and validated. I never know until I get there what my test programme will be, but it’s only rarely about ultimate performance.”

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It blew me away how realistic it was. I was grinning all the way down the Mulsanne Straight

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