Tough battle earns James early present
TWO hard fought points scoring finishes - a 13th and a 15th - after a series of battling drives in his Subaru Levorg against the top tin-top racers in the country, were a welcome early birthday present for Southport’s James Cole in the latest rounds of the 2016 Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship at Knockhill last Sunday.
It should have been three finishes in the top 15 before, in the second of the three races on the tight 1.2 mile Scottish circuit, he was sent tumbling down the order from 14th to 24th by another competitor in the closing stages, before finally making it to 21st at the finish.
Cole, who turned 28 on Tuesday, continues to make good progress in the tough touring car arena as he gains experience from his more experienced teammates in the Silverline Subaru BMR Racing team, double champions Jason Plato and Colin Turkington and the support of Team BMR boss and driver Warren Scott.
Only a fortnight earlier at Snetteton, Cole had scored his first top ten finish since joining the Team BMR outfit at the start of the year, on a day in which the four “Scoobies”, in their first years as a manufacturer entry, in Britain’s premier motor racing series, had all finished in the top ten.
A much improved performance in qualifying with a start from 13th had paid dividends on that occasion and Cole continued that progress last weekend at Knockhill starting his first race of three from 14th.
Before a late red flag incident, the former single-seater champion (Cole was 2009 British Formula Ford Champion and runner-up in the National Class of the British Formula Three International Series in 2010) had looked set for a start in the top ten.
But 14th was a fine effort and Cole’s time was just half a second away from team-mate Plato who was going to start his milestone 500th BTCC race from pole.
In a storming drive Plato went on to record his 95th BTCC victory and his first in the rear wheel drive Subaru.
Second Subaru home was Turkington’s car in third, while Cole was locked in several mid-field battles before finally collecting the final point in 15th.
Starting race two from midfield the Southport racer was once more engaged in a series of frenetic battles on the tricky little track and, with only three laps of the 27 left, was on course for another points finish.
But, in a tete-a-tete with Tom Ingram’s Speedworks Toyota Avensis, he was sent spinning down the field from 14th to 24th but managed to climb back up to 21st at the chequered flag.
Hopes of a second Subaru win for Plato, who had led from the start but now carrying ballast, had also vanished in the closing stages when he was overtaken by triple BTCC champion Matt Neal (Yuasa Racing Honda) and current series leader Sam Tordoff (Team JCT600 with GardX BMW) who went on to finish first and second. Plato still managed to finish third, just ahead of Turkington. Scott had been forced to retire. Cole, due to the misfortunes of having to start the final race of the day from a lowly 11th row, was given another chance to show what might have been. Missing a first lap melee among the lower order he surged though to 16th on lap one, a position he held on to until there was a red flag incident after seven laps to retrieve Ashley Sutton’s off-track MG. Once the race resumed Cole continued to move forward and had jumped up to 14th after another lap and then gained another couple of positions on laps nine and ten. Managing to take full advantage of a number of incidents that befell other competitors Cole slotted into 11th place for several laps before dropping back to finish in 13th after a fast and furious race of non-stop action. He took the chequered flag just 11.8 seconds behind race winner Mat Jackson, his Motorbase Performance Ford Focus team-mate in 2015. With Turkington and Scott classified at the back of the field after contact incidents, Cole was the second Subaru home behind Plato who made it to the podium in third to complete a memorable day for the veteran touring car star.
It had been an action-packed weekend and Cole tweeted: “Knockhill, the rollercoaster of the BTCC. Never a dull moment. Same time next year?”
In a interview on the main BTCC website Cole reported that the relationship between the engineers and the drivers is “very,very good,” as he continues to learn from their wealth of knowledge.
He said: “Colin and Jason are both very accepting of the questions that I ask,” and added: “They have years and years of experience which you would be silly not to try and use.
“They understand it’s for the greater good and if their help brings us along then it’s going to help them because it’ll push them along to.”
For the Silverline Subaru BMR Racing squad there had been mixed fortunes at Knockhill but, with four wins already after their first 21 races in the 30-race series, they are already looming large in the BTCC championship tables.
Turkington and Plato are presently lying in sixth and seventh places in the Drivers’ standings while the Silverline Subaru Team BMR squad are currently lying in fourth place in both the Teams and Manufacturers championships.
With Cole’s contributions last weekend the squad is looking forward to increasing their tally at Rounds 24, 25 and 26 at Rockingham in Northampton over the Bank Holiday weekend on August 27/28.
Said Cole: “It’s a process, and our aim is a 1-2-3-4 on the grid and in races just to annoy everyone else! We’re not quite there yet but we’re definitely getting closer.”