Jason Plato wins red flagged second Silverstone race

Triple Eight’s Jason Plato made it two wins from two in the second Silverstone race, which was red flagged in the closing stages after a huge accident for Rob Collard.

In a carbon copy of race one, West Surrey Racing’s Turkington passed Plato off the line, only for Plato to pull off a daring late move on the brakes at Brooklands to pass the BMW 125i on lap two.

But the race was overshadowed by a terrifying shunt for Collard, who made contact with the half-spinning Ford Focus of Jack Clarke heading onto the Wellington Straight and rolled his BMW, which came to rest on its roof. WSR have since confirmed to TouringCarTimes that Collard is OK but very shaken.

The result means it is unlikely Turkington will clinch the title today, but he has provisionally collected his first piece of silverware. The Northern Irishman now has an 84-point lead in the Independents standings over Motorbase Performance’s Mat Jackson, with a maximum of 80 remaining.

Behind the championship protagonists, Team BMR’s Alain Menu took his second podium of the season, after passing Jackson at Becketts on lap 13.

Fading slightly on the soft tyre, Jackson held on to fourth from a racy Aron Smith, who passed Collard at Becketts a few seconds after Menu had passed Jackson.

Sam Tordoff was sixth, with Fabrizio Giovanardi driving a strong race to seventh, and Andrew Jordan eighth. Team BMR driver-owner Warren Scott took a career-best ninth, with Clarke classified a similarly career-best 10th. Although Clarke dropped back following his accident, the standings were rolled back a lap following the red flag.

Giovanardi was drawn out of the hat for reverse grid pole, and will start at the front for the final race at 17:17 BST.

The battle at the front was close once again, but Turkington sat around a second behind Plato after making a bid to pass out of Copse on lap seven.

In the midfield, Gordon Shedden and Rob Austin continued their on-track fight from Knockhill, with neither willing to give way into Becketts on lap 10. The ensuing contact caused Austin to spin, and he was collected by Jack Goff, who had nowhere to go.

Shedden is now 93 points behind Turkington and is mathematically out of the title fight.