It has taken longer than I wanted it to but I can finally call myself a winner in the British Touring Car Championship and it is a great feeling!
We have been chasing it from the word go and we have been close a couple of times through the season with a few seconds here and there – I was even second in the first race of the weekend - but to finally get that victory is such a good feeling.
It has been a great weekend all round. We had pace in the
BMW 320si from the word go and Team RAC have done a great job to put me out in an excellent car. We were especially quick in qualifying and I was a bit gutted to not get pole position, but Colin pulled a great lap out of the bag. It didn’t matter though because it meant we had an RAC front row, which was great for team at their home event.
The actual win in the third race of the day was a particularly tough one even though I started on pole position thanks to the reverse grid system. It was a great battle with
Jason Plato especially, because a driver of that calibre is hard to keep behind you. He has won so many races and knows every trick in the book, so it was quite a daunting task to keep him behind for the majority of the race.
I just kept treating him like any other rival though, backing him up where I could and then trying to break away. Imagine my relief when he began to slip further behind over the final few laps, although it did leave me to just concentrate on the various creaks and noises that creep into your mind when you get that close to the end of a race. I was thinking ‘what could stop me from winning this race!?’
It is really important for me to get my first win though because I can officially say I am a BTCC winner in my rookie season. As a racing driver you want to win every race, but until it happens you do question when and if it is ever going to happen. Lucky at
Snetterton, I answered my own question!
