For the second successive Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship meeting, Fabrizio Giovanardi made it a double win for VX Racing as he took the honours in race two at
Thruxton.
The Italian held off the challenge of a charging
Matt Neal in the closing stages for his fourth win in five starts from a race that saw arguably the biggest incident seen in the BTCC so far this season.
The drama started before the race even got underway when, as the grid was cleared ready for the green flag lap, the engine on
Jason Plato's SEAT failed to start. Although the car would start before the green flag lap got underway, it was only after a mechanic had remained on the grid beyond the allotted time – meaning that Plato would pick up an automatic drive through penalty.
As the lights went green, it was once again the Team RAC
BMW of
Colin Turkington that made the best start as the Northern Irishman blasted away from the line to take the lead as the field streamed into the complex for the first time. Turkington was then forced to defend from the cars behind during the opening laps as he struggled to get heat into the tyres of the rear-wheel drive machine.
Turkington did the best he could to defend the lead for the first three laps, but on lap four he ran wide coming through Church, not only allowing Giovanardi through into the lead, but dropping all the way down to sixth place.
It meant Giovanardi led from team-mate Tom Chilton, with Matt Neal in an impressive third on his ‘bogey circuit' and Matt Allison in fourth in the Motorbase Performance SEAT Toledo. Behind Allison, Darren Turner was fifth, followed by Turkington and Gareth Howell.
