Tom Chilton expects new Focus to be at the front

2010 Independents’ champion Tom Chilton expects the new Ford Focus will be very competitive, working on set-up changes at the media test day in Arena’s new Super 2000 chassis-NGTC powered challenger.

Arena Motorsport have worked with Ford over the winter to develop the Super 2000 version of Ford’s Global Race Car concept, with Tom Chilton staying on-board with the team for a third consecutive season.

Chilton was happy with his progress at the test, focussing on a rigid set-up routine which saw no long runs and constant changes to adapt the car’s handling at the Silverstone circuit.

“We’re happy with everything with the car, and you can see how much everything’s moved on since last year,” said Chilton to TouringCarTimes.

“Everyone’s now got turbos, they can’t just whinge at us for being fast. Actually, today we were very mediocre in the speed traps, which shows you how much quicker I’m going through the corners, which shows you how much we’ve developed the chassis.”

Despite being the only existing team to build a brand new car for this season, Chilton doesn’t feel the change will have a significant impact on the team’s performance.

“To be absolutely honest, after lunch when I first went out I thought, mmm, doesn’t feel like the car last year around here, but it only needed a few tweaks and had to do a bit of geometry and this and that to work on what we’ve learnt during the winter on our development programme, to make it better.”

“You do have a little bit of a disadvantage with a new car in terms of your first practice session as you don’t have your best set-up from last year as the car is slightly different, but once I get through it, cos I’m very fast at working out how it needs to be, being in the same championship and same cars for ten years.”

Chilton’s new team-mate Andy Neate also ran well, finishing up 10th fastest at the end of the day’s session. Chilton was highly complimentary about his new team-mate.

“Andy’s now got to grips with it and he’s only three tenths off me today, and it’s only his second time in the new car!” said Chilton.

“His first day in was yesterday (Wednesday) at Rockingham, and this is his second day, so he’s doing a good job.”

“He’s so much happier as he was Fiesta champion back in the day and he loved front-wheel drive and he went and tried to learn rear-wheel drive, and at the moment still if he gets a bit of oversteer he’s like, woah, off the throttle because he thinks it’s going to spin like the BMW but now it’s like, no no mate, plant your throttle, but that’ll come and we get on well so he’s a good team-mate.”