Second MG 1-2 as Sam Tordoff wins amid chaos

The roles were reversed at Triple Eight as Sam Tordoff led home Jason Plato for the team’s second one-two of the day, in a chaotic wet race at Donington punctuated by two safety cars and several incidents.

Tordoff got the jump on his team-mate at the start to pass him around the outside into Redgate, and take a lead he wouldn’t lose throughout a long 19 laps.

Behind them, Honda Racing Team’s Gordon Shedden took advantage of a slide for Eurotech Racing’s Andrew Jordan on the exit of the Old Hairpin on lap 15 to take third, with his team-mate Matt Neal coming home fifth.

West Surrey Racing’s Colin Turkington did a good job to take sixth in a car not suited to the conditions, and he was drawn out of the hat for the reverse grid pole for the final race. Behind him were Mat Jackson, Aron Smith and Dave Newsham, with rookie Tom Ingram taking his second top 10 finish of the day.

The result only told part of the story, with a host of incidents providing many talking points.

Lea Wood ran wide at Coppice on lap one as Toyota Avensis stable-mate James Cole took out one of the corner marker boards, before Alain Menu had a huge spin exiting the Old Hairpin in his Team BMR Volkswagen CC. It was a heart-in-mouth moment, but somehow the rest of the field managed to avoid the Swiss’s spinning car.

The safety car was deployed and when it pitted at the end of lap four, Jordan passed Turkington for fourth at Coppice, before Rob Collard span off into the gravel at the bottom of the Craner Curves.

A lap later, another major incident brought out the second safety car. Rob Austin went to pass Chris Stockton, who had Jack Clarke on his outside, at Coppice. The three made contact, causing both Austin and Stockton to spin.

Behind them, James Cole was on the outside of the Rotek Racing Audi S3 of Robb Holland; the two made contact, and both hit the wall hard on the outside of Hollywood.

Holland’s car was left with extensive front-end damage, while Cole’s Toyota Avensis took huge damage to the right hand side, losing both its doors.

There was an extra safety car lap when Ollie Jackson’s Proton Gen-2 ground to a halt on the exit of the final chicane, and when racing finally resumed, Hunter Abbott became the seventh and final retirement when he went off at Coppice.

Martin Depper and Marc Hynes also both had late spins – the latter for the second time in the race – but Tordoff was serene out in front, in a race which ironically finished with the sun creeping through the clouds.