We knew we could do it from the word go, and once we got that grid position it was really just a case of going out there, keeping it on the island and picking up the points, and it worked. Colin was all over us for a lot of the race. We knew from the first two that we had a faster car than the RAC team, but at
Thruxton you’ve got the tow down the main straight which is such an advantage, and we couldn’t quite break the tow to Colin which meant he was right on our bumper every lap going into the chicane. It was tough but a very clean race, though – Colin is a very fair driver – and it’s nice to race against somebody like that.
Obviously the last round is always the nicest one to win because it’s the one everybody remembers. Unfortunately I think it was overshadowed a little bit by Fabrizio Giovanardi’s championship, but nevertheless it was another win and that’s all that matters.
Looking back, this year has been a very steep learning curve for both myself and the team. Nine months ago the
BMW was a car we hadn’t seen before. We picked it up in early January, and couldn’t do much testing because the budget didn’t stretch that far. It was always going to be tough, especially being up against teams like West Surrey, SEAT, Vauxhall and Dynamics. To some extent money is no issue to them, so they’re going to get there by hook or by crook. For us it was slightly different; we’d got what we’d got and we had to make it work. The team doesn’t employ anybody full-time, so it requires a lot of effort on both my part and that of the family.
