Hopefully one day we will be in the same situation, with somebody in front kicking out loads of oil and they will be black-flagged which will allow us to gain a podium. The most galling thing is I didn’t actually see the flag on the track – it was only when I came into the pits at the end of the race and my team said to me ‘didn’t you see the black-and-orange flag?’ and I replied ‘no, I didn’t, why?’ We did the job but I can see it from the officials’ point-of-view too, and they probably took the right decision. It was a moral victory though.
Then in race two, because I had finished third on the road in the opening one, we had to run with 27kg ballast in the car, which made things pretty hard. Obviously we were also 26th on the grid, and we thought ok either we can start from the back or we let the crashes happen.
I think starting from the pitlane was the right decision. We may have lost out a little bit position-wise, but we managed to come through. It’s a long, long race and there are always going to be incidents in touring cars. You need to keep your eyes behind you as well. After coming back up to eighth place we unfortunately then also missed out on the reverse grid for race three, with Fabrizio Giovanardi who finished just ahead of me in seventh getting the pole.
I got another cracking start, but just got hung out to dry by the two Vauxhalls around Paddock Hill Bend, and it was a question of do you turn in or not. I didn’t, so having got up to third at the first corner I dropped a few places again back to seventh. The car was blinding though – the BMW’s performance is incredible.
