BTC Racing's Chris Stockton admits that he isn't too confident heading to
Thruxton as the team continues to come to grips with its switch from the Lexus IS200 to the ex-Motorbase Performance SEAT Toledos.
The team made the move ahead of the last round of the HiQ MSA British Touring Car Championship at
Donington Park with Stockton and Stuart Oliver facing the challenge of moving into front-wheel drive for the first time.
Although Oliver saw his chances hit by an accident during the second race, Stockton was able to break into the points for the first time this year with a solid run to eighth in race two.
However, Stockton admitted that he wasn't expecting an easy weekend at Thruxton despite it being a circuit where the car has gone well in the past – winning on its debut with the SEAT Sport team back in 2004 and also running strongly in the hands of Gareth Howell and Matt Allison last year as the pair enjoyed one of their strongest weekends of the campaign.
"I'm not confident," he told
Crash.net, "I'm genuinely not and I'm normally quite an upbeat kind of person. These cars are different to drive compared to anything I have driven before and I really need seat time.
"I need to be able to overlay my data with other people's data so I can tell you where we are and the moment, we are a second and half off the dry pace compared to where the cars should be. I have to look to myself to find that."
Stockton did add however, that the decision to bring in Howell as a test and reserve driver for the 2008 season would be a big benefit in getting up to speed.
"These cars were never on the agenda and Gareth was always coming in to do a few races for us when Stuart or I are unavailable," he said. "As it is, it couldn't have turned out better for us to have him on board with the SEAT, and hopefully his feedback will help us.
"We knew we were on the back foot at Donington but had a good run in race two with times that went well compared to the front boys. Then we had a puncture on the green flag lap when on pole for race three.
