Photo: BTCC Media

Turner takes Rockingham pole

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SEAT driver Darren Turner (Leamington-Spa) has taken the first Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship pole position of his career in qualifying for tomorrow’s (Sunday) three rounds at the Rockingham circuit in Northamptonshire.

On his final lap, Turner, in his SEAT Leon, set a time of 1m24.908s to edge out the Vauxhall Vectra of Italian Fabrizio Giovanardi by just 0.028s and steal top spot on the starting grid. Turner’s team-mate and the championship leader Jason Plato (Oxford) was third fastest with a best time of 1m25.253s.

Team RAC BMW driver Colin Turkington (Portadown) qualified fourth fastest, but later had all his times disallowed after his car failed a weight check procedure at the end of the session. He has thus been relegated to 25th, on the back row of the 26-strong grid. Alongside him will be Independents Drivers’ points leader Adam Jones (Solihull) – having dazzled in earlier practice, he failed to set a lap time in qualifying after his Team Air Cool SEAT Toledo suffered engine problems. He is keeping his fingers crossed that the problem can be fixed overnight.

Turkington’s exclusion meant that promoted to fourth was Vauxhall’s Tom Chilton (Reigate) and, to a best-ever fifth, Irish driver Eoin Murray in Quest Racing’s Alfa Romeo. Reigning champion Matt Neal (Droitwich), second in the current standings in his Team Halfords Honda Civic, completed the top six.

Turner, only tenth in the championship standings, said: “That was a bit tight. My first run didn’t work out and on the second I got a lot of slower cars in my way. It meant I had just one lap left and, fortunately, it all came together. Let’s hope being on pole means I can get some good results and stay out of trouble. I need to get my title chances back on track.”

Giovanardi, fifth in the championship, said: “I will never be happy when I am not first. I think my final qualifying lap should have been better, but I made a small mistake into the hairpin after the start-finish straight. Despite this, I feel good and I’m going to make it very hard for anyone to beat me tomorrow.”

Plato, third fastest despite his Leon carrying the maximum success ballast of 45kgs, said: “I’m very pleased with that. I think SEAT is a bit of a class act here at Rockingham as both our cars, with or without weight, are right up there. It’d be great to see Darren get his first win in the BTCC but of course I want victories as usual and we’re both here to help SEAT close the gap to Vauxhall in the Manufacturers’ championship. If everything goes to plan tomorrow, we should be leaving here with our chests puffed out.”