TURKING TON TURNS UP THE HEAT
Bmw man snatches the advantage at rockingham
The balance of power in the race for this year’s British Touring Car Championship shifted last weekend, swinging in between WSR BMW 125i M Sport driver Colin Turkington and Speedworks Motorsport Toyota Avensis driver Tom Ingram.
But they weren’t the ones who climbed on to the top step of the rostrum in any of the three races at Rockingham. While Turkington and Ingram were about collecting points without taking any big risks, there were smiles elsewhere.
Adam Morgan claimed race one in his Ciceley Motorsport Mercedes-benz A-class, while champion Ash Sutton, who is third in the points, took his Team BMR Subaru Levorg to victory in the second event.
In race three, there was a highly popular maiden win for the BTC Norlin Honda Civic of Northern Irishman Chris Smiley.
Race one
Morgan’s journey to race one victory was helped massively when he reached the Deene hairpin on lap one.
Behind him, third-placed Dan Cammish (Team Dynamics Honda Civic Type R) had a hopeful look down the inside of front-row starter Sam Tordoff (Motorbase Performance Ford Focus) and the pair made contact going into the left-hander.
The Focus was spun around and that caused chaos behind, ironically involving Matt Neal’s Team Dynamics Honda Civic Type R. Neal had been forced to have an engine change on his Japanese car after free practice and before qualifying, and left him out of sorts for the timed session. From 29th on the grid, Neal was unsighted when he reached the opening turn and hit Tordoff’s car – as did Andrew Jordan (WSR BMW 125i M Sport), Brett Smith (Eurotech Racing Honda Civic) and Sam Smelt (Amdtuning.com Audi S3).
That prompted a safety car, but Morgan controlled the restart perfectly to zoom away again. “It was getting tricky though,” said the Lancastrian. “There was a rain shower in the early laps and I was having to be super cautious on the brakes. But I could see that I had a reasonable gap and I had enough in hand to manage the lead to the end of the race.”
Behind him, Tom Chilton (Motorbase Performance Ford Focus) knew he was in trouble after just a few tours. “My front tyres were rooted,” he explained. “I was just hanging on, and then the rain came. With no grip from the rubber and then water on the track, life was very difficult.”
It was even more tough because he had the Subaru of reigning champion Sutton crawling all over him. Sutton worked hard to forge an opening, and managed it on lap 13 of 18 when he threw the car up the inside into the Tarzan hairpin. “I was trying to work out where I was faster, and I knew Tom was backing me up in those places. So I had to sell him a dummy,” said Sutton. “I did, and it worked really well.”
The next drivers to have Chilton in their sights were Cammish and Smiley. They had been quite physical and swapped paint as they traded places, but Smiley managed to outdrag Cammish away from the final corner to grab fourth and finish in the wheeltracks of Chilton.
Smiley had been lucky to make the finish at all after collecting serious damage in the first-lap smash. The temperatures in the car were high due to the broken front end. “That meant that we were losing power in a straight line,” said Smiley. “Still, I was pretty pleased with the result.”
Behind the top five, Mike Bushell (Team Hard VW) was a lonely sixth in what had been an encouraging weekend for the Kent racer.
There was no encouragement to be found at the Speedworks team. Ingram had been lugging his maximum ballast, 75kg, around in a highly creditable seventh spot. That was until the fly-by-wire throttle failed with less than half a mile of the event remaining.
“We were doing a reasonable job given the circumstances,” said Ingram. “There was no warning, nothing. It just stopped.”
That promoted Turkington to seventh. The BMW had been in the wheeltracks of Ingram throughout and was enjoying the battle, but was relieved when his foe pulled off. The result moved the Northern Irishman into the championship lead by three points.
Aiden Moffat (Laser Tools Racing Mercedes-benz A-class) and the charging Rory Butcher (Amdtuning. com MG6) were the next finishers.
A handling-afflicted Jack Goff (Eurotech Racing Honda Civic Type R) was fourth in the standings coming into the meeting but could only manage 13th place with the 48kg aboard. He had been chasing the hatchback’s handling all weekend. Neal came home in 18th spot.
Race two
The Subaru Levorg has always been a chassis that carries the weight well, and the 66kg fitted to the passenger footwell of Sutton’s estate-shaped machine as he lined up on the front row of the grid would not have been too much of a concern.
However, what was happening above his head was troublesome. A shower before the race had drivers in a quandary over tyres. Sutton had actually gone to the grid on wet weather covers before he changed his mind on the grid and, like the rest of the runners opted for dry tyres.
“It is a good job we did too,” said the race winner, who powered away from the line and ahead of Morgan by the turn-in for the first banked corner. “I was a bit concerned because I hadn’t had the lap to the grid to get warmth into the rubber – I only had the warm-up lap, so I was in
worse shape than those around me. It was just a question of being careful and creeping up on the braking areas – just slowing a little earlier than usual.
“Those conditions are not great for rear-wheel-drive cars and I really thought I was going to struggle but, in the end, the car was great.”
Morgan’s run to second place in race two was uneventful. He tried to put pressure on Sutton, but the 75kg of success ballast meant he was in no-man’s land. “I could try to close, but Ash was just too fast,” said Morgan. “I was actually watching my mirror, and then I saw Ingram coming up behind me and I couldn’t believe it.”
It was unbelievable. Ingram’s opening two laps had seen him leap from 27th on the grid up to 12th and then he picked off the queue of cars ahead until he reached fourth place. The Speedworks man was forced into a battle to get ahead of Senna Proctor’s Power Maxed Racing Vauxhall and he nearly did it when the birthday boy ran wide at the final chicane on lap 15. When he erred again two laps later, Ingram was through.
“My engineer [Spencer Aldridge] was on the radio telling me I was in the top 12 and that I had plenty of time to make my way to the top,” said Ingram. “I took the chances where I could, but I also knew I had to be careful. It is just a shame that we have to charge from the back in race two – it was just like we had to do at Snetterton too [after an alternator failure].”
Behind the impressive Proctor, Turkington was not enjoying the mixed weather, like Sutton, knowing that the conditions were not favourable to the rear-wheel-drive car. “It was tricky coming off the slow speed corners – I was losing too much with the wheelspin,” said the Northern Irishman. Still, fifth spot kept the points tally ticking over nicely, even if he had been deposed at the top of the table by Ingram.
Smiley put in another solid performance to follow Turkington home. Bushell had been in third place early on until he was shoved wide as Proctor came past, and he dropped down the order to seventh spot (although he was later promoted to sixth when Smiley copped a penalty).
Butcher, Matt Simpson (Eurotech Honda Civic) and Chilton rounded out the top 10, and that was a boost for the latter, who was drawn on pole for the reversed grid finale. Neal finished in a lowly 14th spot to earn two points after a tough couple of events for him, while Goff was 15th, both losing further ground to Ingram.
Race three
Smiley has told anyone who will listen that he was going to break into the winner’s circle. He has unshakeable belief in himself and his BTC Norlin crew. The emotion on his face as he crossed the line following 16 laps of the tough Rockingham track showed how much his maiden victory meant to him.
The Northern Irishman took advantage of a slippery track at the opening hairpin after a pre-race shower dampened the circuit.
Chilton was on pole and he was the first to find it and ran wide. He was followed onto the grass by Simpson and Bushell. Champion Sutton also ran off the road and was delayed but it was a real shake up at the head of the pack.
Smiley was one of the few not on the less favoured hard tyre – most had saved it for race three in the hope that rain would come and they would not have to use it. They were wrong, and with Simpson delayed, Smiley was sitting pretty.
He took charge and was pursued by the impressive Butcher in the MG until the Scot was demoted and later slid off at the Deene hairpin. He rejoined in sixth spot.
Second place was only decided at the very last corner when Turkington’s BMW 125i M Sport capitalised when Simpson, who had recovered from his earlier slip, ran slightly wide at the Brook chicane.
Turkington launched his car up the inside and beat Simpson on the dash to the line, with the Focus of Tordoff narrowly missing out on grabbing a first podium of the season too – but at least it was something positive after his race one heartbreak.
Smiley said: “This has been such a long time coming. I am over the moon, and I have worked so hard to get here. I can’t thank the team enough.”
Turkington said he had gone into the race with an aggressive strategy. “I was concerned about the rain, because those aren’t the best conditions for a rearwheel-drive car, but I had to go for it.
“I took calculated risks and it was a race of patience. I could see Simpson’s tyres had gone off by the end, and I pounced.”
Simpson was gutted to have lost out in the final reckoning but knew he had been lucky to see the flag at all. “The front right died a death over the last few laps,” said the Honda man. “I could see Colin coming and I knew I was in trouble, but that was my third top 10 of the weekend, and that is something I have never done in the BTCC before, so it is progress.”
Behind Tordoff in fourth, Ingram grabbed an unchallenged fifth. Butcher followed, and one of the drives of the race came from Team Hard VW CC man Bobby Thompson, who went from 28th to seventh although he did have the benefit of the preferable prime rubber.
The top 10 was rounded out by race one winner Morgan, Ollie Jackson (Amdtuning.com Audi) and Cammish.
The results of the three races mean that Turkington is leading the points by four ahead of Ingram. Sutton is 32 points adrift in third and is lurking ominously.