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Colin Turkington pleased with Brands Hatch recovery

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Colin Turkington admitted he was delighted to recover from a dramatic start to his BTCC season to secure a first podium finish of the campaign at Brands Hatch.

Turkington’s first race back with West Surrey Racing was over pretty much before it began after a clash with Matt Neal at the start forced him into retirement before evening reaching the end of the pits.

It meant the two-time champion was forced to start race two from the back of the grid, but a fine recovery to ninth spot then set him up for a charge to the front in race three – with only team-mate Andrew Jordan still ahead by the time the chequered flag dropped.

“Race one was a disaster and from there, I thought I’d just try and see what we could recover from the weekend,” he told TouringCarTimes. “It was fantastic that we were able to end up on a high with a podium finish and showed that you can’t give up in this championship as you can always fight back if you have a good car.

“Because we hadn’t had much chance to test with the new engine over the winter, we didn’t really know what we had going into the weekend but from the performance on track, it’s clear to see we have taken real steps forward and have what we need to be competitive this season.”

With Turkington’s team-mate Rob Collard securing three top seven finishes – including a podium of his own – Team BMW sits second in the early season Teams’ Championship; a fact that pleased team boss Dick Bennetts.

“I’m very pleased that Team BMW has put on such a strong performance across the weekend,” he said. “To have had Rob and Colin both on the podium, the strongest overall race pace and second place in the Teams’ Championship was an excellent team result and a just reward for the long hours and hard work put in by everyone at WSR over the past few weeks.

“It’s also fantastic for BMW and our engine partner Neil Brown Engineering to secure this result on the first weekend for the new powerplant. The icing on the cake, of course, is to have BMW at the head of the Manufacturers’ Championship on their return to the BTCC as a Manufacturer entrant. We’ve worked very hard for this.”