High Drama for Motorbase at Oulton

An incident-packed race provided another tale of two cars for Motorbase Performance BMW in race three of the HiQ MSA British Touring Car Championship at Oulton Park. As in the previous race, one of the team’s cars finished in the top 10 – while the other was forced into retirement.

Rob Collard’s BMW 320si almost didn’t make it out of the garage at all after an engine sensor problem meant the Motorbase engineers had to battle right up until the last second to make sure he could race. It was such a close call that Collard would have had to go from the pits had it not been for a delayed start. However, as it was he was forced to begin the race from the back of the grid.

His team-mate Kane was quickly away from sixth position on the grid when the flag dropped, and was involved in the thick of it at the front of the pack when he was hit from behind by the Honda of Tom Chilton – wrecking the both car and his chances of finishing.

As the dramatic race unfolded Rob Collard stormed his way through the field, moving up half a dozen places within a few laps. He broke into the top ten after eight laps and then enjoyed a joust with Jason Hughes before eventually passing the MG ZS to take eighth position.

Not content with having already carved his way through the field from dead last to eighth, Collard then put in some flying laps as he broke free of traffic and quickly began to catch the Team RAC BMW of Colin Turkington in front of him. However, with a shortened race due to earlier incidents there was just not enough time for him to grab seventh place to further add to his heroics.

The Motorbase team were overjoyed to see Collard cross the finish line after such a dramatic outing, and his gritty performance reflected the determination of the mechanics who managed to get the car into the race at the last minute.

Motorbase Performance Team Principal David Bartrum said:
“I have to thank all the boys in the garage as they have been first class this weekend. Rob drove a fantastic race after the problems we had with his car, and he deserved a good run after being unlucky in the previous race. It’s just a shame that Steven was put out because there was no need for it. Our race pace has been really pleasing this weekend though so we’ll be looking to show that again at Knockhill and score a lot more points.”

Motorbase Performance Team Driver Steven Kane said:
“I’m absolutely gutted. The car felt mega, even with the extra weight, and I got away well. Then I just got taken out and there was nothing I could do about it. The team have done an amazing job this weekend and everyone has worked so hard, so it was great that Rob managed to get us into the points.”

Motorbase Performance Team Driver Rob Collard said:
“I was very, very lucky to get out for that race at all, so I’m delighted to have managed to get into the points after effectively starting from the pits. I was really nervous with the car in the first couple of laps because the temperature was going up and down a lot, but once that settled down I just had to concentrate on driving hard and making up some places. I was reeling in Turkington quickly and if the race hadn’t been shortened I would have caught him. In the end it was a great result for the team after all their hard work on getting my car back into action. The Motorbase team have turned out really good, fast race cars this weekend, and if we can sort out our qualifying form we will be a force to be reckoned with.”