Dan Welch and Richard Hawken to race at Donington Park

Both Dan Welch and Richard Hawken will make their first appearances of the 2015 British Touring Car season at Donington Park after both were forced to watch the opening round from the sidelines.

An ankle injury saw Dan Welch move around the Brands Hatch paddock with the help of a pair of crutches, but his injury has since healed enough to get back in the Welch Motorsport Proton Gen-2. He will line up alongside teammate Andy Wilmot, who missed the Brands Hatch races following mechanical issues in practice and qualifying.

“I have two broken bones in my foot, including the metatarsal, and another small bone in my back,” Welch told btcc.net. “They haven’t completely healed but I’ve just got to man up and get on with it.

“We have made a real breakthrough with the engine too and believe we’ve found the problem which caused so much frustration at Brands Hatch. We changed everything over the winter and we were pretty surprised by the setback, but now we’re feeling quietly optimistic about the weekend ahead.”

Meanwhile, Richard Hawken will make his BTCC debut in the second Infiniti Q50, following a challenging opening round for the team, which saw steady improvement in lap times from Derek Palmer Jr.

“Sitting out Brands Hatch was tough for many reasons,” said Hawken. “Firstly it’s my local track, as I live in Surrey 45 mins away; secondly it’s the circuit I have had the most poles, most outright wins and most fastest laps on in the Super Touring cars I raced. So when you’re confident and you lose your seat for that race it becomes very tough indeed to handle the rush of emotions and disappointment.

Ultimately I am a racer, so I want to do as well as I can. However, being a debutant and not having had the experience from the first race weekend, or testing for that matter, I am looking to finish all three races well, hopefully without drama. If I can break into the top 20 I will pat myself on the back and consider than an achievement for my first weekend.”