Rob Collard’s two wins at Knockhill on Sunday close him up to Andrew Jordan in both the overall standings as well as the independents’ trophy to just 34 points behind.
Qualifying on the front-row alongside Jason Plato’s Triple Eight MG, it was almost a certainty that the fast-starting driver with the rear-wheel drive West Surrey Racing BMW would lead into the SEAT curve, which he did and went on to take his first win since the opening round at Brands Hatch almost five months ago.
Starting again from pole for race two, Collard took another victory despite carrying 45kg of extra ballast, but battle damage in race three meant he could manage no better than ninth from tenth with the reverse grid.
“It’s been fabulous, you wait for ages to get a win and then all of a sudden two come along at once,” said Collard to TouringCarTimes. “Knockhill’s always been one of my favourite tracks, it gave me my first overall win here, and to do what we’ve done today has been fabulous.”
“(I was) a little unfortunate in race three, we got caught up and took some body and suspension damage at the chicane with (Gordon) Shedden…and we just had to limp the car home.”
Last time out at Snetterton, an engine failure in the first race of the day was Collard’s first retirement of the season. The team were unable to complete the engine change before race two which saw Collard drop a lot of points to Eurotech Racing’s Andrew Jordan in the two drivers’ championships.
“If we didn’t have those issues we’d be third or fourth now quite comfortably. I’m really disappointed that we had an engine failure, but hopefully we can just build on this and go to Rockingham and score more points, it’s not to be sneezed at being in the top five at the moment.”
In the overall standings, Rob Collard’s in fifth place on 228 points, 19 points behind Jordan and and 23 behind Jason Plato with 21 points available for a win. The independents’ standings are below:
BTCC Independent Drivers’ Trophy Standings after Knockhill
