Sunday, July 31 2016

Mat Jackson won an incident-packed second Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship race at Snetterton today (Sunday), passing polesitter Colin Turkington on both opening laps of a red-flag interrupted encounter.

On the first start, Turkington scarpered away from the line, and with Gordon Shedden getting wheelspin, Jackson surged through to second and successfully attacked the leader at Wilson to take the lead into the hairpin. Adam Morgan and Tom Ingram followed the reigning champion, with Jason Plato, Sam Tordoff, Matt Neal and Rob Collard following. There were several incidents at the tail of the field, including a big shunt on the Bentley Straight that involved Ollie Jackson, and Dan Welch, and the safety car was called out, soon to be changed to a red flag. The opening lap victims included Ash Sutton, Alex Martin, Hunter Abbott and Kelvin Fletcher.

With the incident occurring on the opening lap, the restart would be to the original grid order, meaning that Turkington would have the change to make amends. His lead lasted three more corners this time, with Jackson grabbing the lead into Hamilton, and Shedden, Morgan and Plato following behind. Shedden and Morgan collided into Wilson on lap two, bringing Matt Neal and Tom Ingram into play. Shedden was punted down the order at Agostini, and battles rippled down the field, but miraculously everyone made it through safely.

Meanwhile, Jackson was pulling away from the ballast-laden Turkington, whilst Morgan was defending heavily from Neal. In fifth place, Plato was coming under attack from a fast-starting Collard, whilst Ingram and Tordoff held station behind. Collard made it through on lap four and set off after Neal.

Meanwhile Shedden's race continued to fall apart; sideways at Coram, he was passed on the following lap by Rob Austin, and both Aiden Moffatt and Jake Hill lined up an attack. They needed to, for two chargers, Josh Cook and Andrew Jordan were right behind.

Neal passed Morgan as Collard arrived on their tail. A ballsy move at Hamilton gave him the place, and some breathing space for Neal. Only enough for one lap, however, and soon the BMW was back on the attack. On lap eight Collard feinted a move into Agostini; Neal defended but Collard attacked again halfway round the hairpin. The pair ran side-by-side for a couple of corners, and when Collard ran Neal off the road, the Honda driver kept the boot in and regained the place.

Neal and Collard continued to squabble until the flag, the BMW getting close on several occasions, but there was no way past. The Honda veteran even kept in touch with the leaders, where Jackson led Turkington home for his third win of the season.

Finishing eighth, Tordoff still leads the championship, but his lead has been reduced to nine points by Neal. However, with seventh place drawn for the reverse-grid race three, he has an excellent chance to extend this, whilst Plato could win his first race of the year from third place.

Race three will take place just after 5pm.

Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship race two
1, Mat Jackson, Motorbase, Ford Focus, 10 Laps
2, Colin Turkington, Subaru Team BMR, Subaru Levorg GT, +1.190s
3, Matt Neal, Halfords Yuasa Racing, Honda Civic Type R, +1.950s
4, Rob Collard, Team JCT600 with GuardX, BMW 125i M-Sport, +2.140s
5, Adam Morgan, WIX Racing, Mercedes-Benz A-Class, +7.255s
6, Jason Plato, Subaru Team BMR, Subaru Levorg GT, +7.687s
7, Tom Ingram, Speedworks Motorsport, Toyota Avensis, +8.421s
8, Sam Tordoff, Team JCT600 with GuardX, BMW 125i M-Sport, +9.935s
9, Rob Austin, Handy Motorsport, Toyota Avensis, +11.649s
10, Gordon Shedden, Halfords Yuasa Racing, Honda Civic Type R, +11.989s

Next weekend (6/7 August), Snetterton hosts the British GT and BRDC British F3 championships. Tickets are available from £19, with free admission for under-13s. For more information call our sales team on 0843 453 9000 or click here.