Jones: It's been far from easy...

Adam Jones has admitted that the last few months have been far from easy as his participation in the 2007 Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship was left hanging in the balance.

Jones had almost been ready to announce his plans at the Autosport International show back in January before sponsorship issues put a question mark over his entry, but hard work since then has ensured that he will contest seven events this season in a SEAT Toledo run by GR Asia - the team's WTCC commitments forcing him to miss the other three meetings.

Running under the Team Air Cool banner, Jones will make his debut in the SEAT at Brands Hatch, to bring to an end a difficult few months that he likened to being on a rollercoaster in his first exclusive Crash.net column.

"It's pretty bizarre really, because we had been so far ahead - schedule wise - with sponsors and everything that we could possibly have announced something at the NEC, but then one thing led to another and - while we have had some highs - we've had a lot of lows," he said. "One minute it was on, then it was off, then it was one again. One minute we had the full budget and then we had hardly anything - it's been just like a rollercoaster. To be honest with you, I can't really describe it and tell you how stressful it's been.

"Les Latham, my manager, will probably tell you I've had it easy but as driver I think you feel that stress more than anything. The work that has gone in from all involved to get us on the grid has been amazing, from the smaller sponsors who we have on the side of the car to title sponsors Air Cool Engineering - without a shadow of a doubt I would not be standing talking to you now without the help of Dave Clews at Air Cool and we wouldn't be competing in the championship, its as simple as that. We are finally here, it's been very rushed but now we have most of the hard work done and out of the way, we can hand the car to Paul Ridgeway at GR Asia to get it ready to rock and roll.

"We'd had this plan in the pipeline as well as other plans with other teams for the 2007 season, but I think this was always going to be the best package for us with what we wanted to do and what we wanted to achieve this year. Then it all went a bit 'tits up' and as I've described it to people, I feel like I've had a right kick in the bollocks over the winter! It's been so tough and it's been so hard that I almost split up with my long-term girlfriend of six years over it. It got to the point where it was so bad that I had to sort myself out and focus on the job at hand and reorganise the way I was thinking and doing things. It has been so hard but the majority of the work is now done, so now I'm looking forward to the first race in a couple of weeks."

Having driven the Xero Competition Lexus last season on his debut in the series, Jones will have to get used to front-wheel drive for the new season but he said he was looking forward to the new campaign, which gets underway at Brands Hatch on 1 April.

"Well, there are a lot of cars on the grid and I don't think the BTCC has had this many cars at the start of the year for a long time," he said. "At Brands Hatch, a short circuit with a lot of cars, if we can have a good qualifying session and come out of the three races unscathed with some points then I'll be more than happy with that. We need to do a shakedown test at some point before the first race as I haven't sat in the car yet and it's a front-wheel drive car which I'll need to get used to as I haven't driven a front-wheel drive car.

"I have some learning to do there which hopefully won't take long and I'm just looking forward to it."