Next up, Silverstone – the last power circuit of 2010

The Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship will take place this weekend at the Silverstone National circuit, and Chevrolet will be looking to repeat their strong performance from 2009, where the team, then armed with three Lacettis, took a dominating 1-2-3 in the first race of the weekend.

Obviously, with only two cars this year for Jason Plato & Alex MacDowall, a 1-2 will be just as perfect a result to aim for – the question will be whether the new Chevrolet Cruze will still have the dominating pace at the Northamptonshire circuit as was seen at Snetterton two weeks ago.

Alex MacDowall took his maiden pole there, but a weakened gear lever came off in the 19-year old’s hand at the start of the first race, which effectively wrecked the rest of his weekend; whereas team mate Jason Plato enjoyed his strongest race meeting of the season and sailed into the lead of the drivers championship. MacDowall’s hoping for better things this weekend:

“I’m really confident ahead of Silverstone National”, said Alex,

“It’s a short track which mainly consists of long straights and the high speed right-hander at Copse which should suit the Chevrolet Cruze. I went well there in the Renault Clio Cup last year, taking a podium, so I’m looking to emulate my qualifying performance from Snetterton and come away with 15 to 20 points at least.”

The Honda Racing Team, sitting in the championship lead throughout the summer break, took a knock back in the first two races, but managed to take advantage of the top 10 reverse grid in the second race to take a win for Gordon Shedden and a third for Matt Neal.
Struggling with a lack of straight line speed against the Chevrolets, BMWs & Fords – Matt Neal hopes some changes for Silverstone will help the Civic fight back.

“Our engine tuner Neil Brown has looked closely at the engine and we have managed to extract even more power from it which will be an advantage for us,” said Neal.
“We think we have found a few more horsepower. We won’t know exactly how much it will push us forward until we get on to the circuit for the free practice on Saturday but I hope it will help us rein the others in.”

Team mate Gordon Shedden expects Silverstone won’t really suit the Civic, and is hoping a repeat of the result at Snetterton is the team’s best hope.
“Silverstone is a circuit that is going to be tough for us so I need to look at banking as many points as possible and I need to get to the end of all three rounds,” said Shedden.

“If I can maximise the reversed grid race again, like I did at Snetterton, it could present us with the best opportunity to score a lot. It’s a delicate stage of the season and we need to keep the pressure on.”

Airwaves BMW had a lucky escape courtesy of a non-finish for Team Aon’s Tom Onslow-Cole in the third race at Snetterton, and kept the lead in the Independents’ Team Trophy as well as allowing Steven Kane to retake the lead of the Independents’ driver standings.

Both of Airwaves BMW’s drivers Steven Kane & Mat Jackson are within 50 points of championship leader Plato, and are still in a position to challenge for the overall championship should further problems beset the two Honda’s as well as Plato or Onslow-Cole.

Mat Jackson won two races here last year, and a podium in the other whilst racing for the Racing Silverline team, and is hoping for a good run again.

“Motorbase did well here in 2009 and with our progress over the summer break it looks like it could be interesting,” said Mat.

“Although the LPGs and Chevys have something we don’t – that much is obvious – we have a car that can go round corners and that will make things pretty close and exciting even if Silverstone is a power circuit. In my honest opinion I think we’re in great shape and in a great car.”

The major threat is expected to come again from the Team Aon Fords, which will undoubtedly be able to take great advantage of the National circuit’s Wellington Straight with their turbo-charged LPG engines. Tom Chilton enjoyed his best run of the season at the last race meeting, and the team will be vying to put right their failure to take a win at the circuit where they were most expected to dominate.

“Like Snetterton two weeks ago, the layout of the Silverstone track plays to the strengths of our LPG powered, turbo-charged Ford Focus,” said Chilton.

“It has two long straights where we can expect to have a slight advantage and more importantly, only two heavy braking areas, which is where everyone else has an advantage over us.”

Team Principal Mike Earle hopes the Focus will be closer to the Chevrolets this weekend, and is still baffled by their pace at Snetterton.

“After a bitter sweet weekend at Snetterton, where we were not fast enough to beat Jason Plato, we go to Silverstone hoping to at least fight for victory, which will be tough given the improved pace of the two Chevrolets, but hopefully, even with our new smaller restrictors we will be able to make a race of it, unlike Snetterton where Jason just drove off into the distance in the first two races, despite his car carrying success ballast!”

They’re not the only turbo cars however, and with the Next Generation Touring Car (NGTC) engined Vauxhalls of Dave Pinkney and Andrew Jordan featuring at the top of the speed traps at Snetterton, a good car set-up could see some good results for the two drivers.

Pirtek Racing’s Andrew Jordan said:
“The power of our engine could certainly prove useful over the weekend for both straight line speed and getting a good exit out from the corners. We’ve solved our issues from the final race at Snetterton and we really hope to go out there and get back onto the podium.”

There is one new turbo joining the grid, in the shape of a second SEAT León for Special Tuning UK with support from YourRacingCar.com. The car, run by Club SEAT for Gordon Shedden at the end of last year, has now also been fitted with the NGTC engine, and will be driven by 2009 Elf Renault Clio Cup champion and former Triple Eight Race Engineering driver Phil Glew at the weekend. The team are approaching the event as very much a development weekend, but all eyes will be on the first team to run the championship’s new engine in a different car.

The addition of the Special Tuning UK SEAT puts the grid back up to 22 cars, pending any last minute announcements.

Entry List for Rounds 19-21, Silverstone.

No – Driver – Team – Car [Ballast]
2 – Jason Plato – Silverline Chevrolet – Chevrolet Cruze [45kg]
4 – Matt Neal – Honda Racing Team – Honda Civic [36kg]
5 – Mat Jackson – Airwaves BMW – BMW 320si
6 – Robert Collard – West Surrey Racing – BMW 320si
11 – Steven Kane – Airwaves BMW – BMW 320si [9kg]
14 – James Nash – Triple Eight Race Engineering – Vauxhall Vectra
20 – Alex MacDowall – Silverline Chevrolet – Chevrolet Cruze
21 – Tom Onslow-Cole – Team Aon – Ford Focus ST [18kg]
22 – Tom Boardman – Special Tuning UK – SEAT León
23 – Tom Chilton – Team Aon – Ford Focus ST
27 – Martin Johnson – Boulevard Team Racing – Vauxhall Astra Coupe
28 – John George – Sunshine.co.uk with Techspeed – Honda Integra Type-R
29 – Paul O’Neill – Sunshine.co.uk with Techspeed – Honda Integra Type-R
30 – Martin Depper – Forster Motorsport – BMW 320si
37 – Arthur Forster – Forster Motorsport – BMW 320si
43 – Lea Wood – Central Group Racing – Honda Integra Type-R
44 – Andy Neate – West Surrey Racing – BMW 320si
52 – Gordon Shedden – Honda Racing Team – Honda Civic [27kg]
55 – Dave Pinkney – Pinkney Motorsport – Vauxhall Vectra
77 – Andrew Jordan – Pirtek Racing – Vauxhall Vectra
88 – Phil Glew – Special Tuning UK – SEAT León
99 – Shaun Hollamby – AmD Milltek Racing – Volkswagen Golf