Turkington voted best STCC rookie and WTCC independent

Colin Turkington claimed two titles in the 2011 TouringCarTimes Awards. The BMW driver was voted both best rookie of the Scandinavian Touring Car Championship and best independent of the FIA World Touring Car Championship.
“I am really chuffed about that. It is not easy in the first year to pick everything up quickly, but I had an enjoyable year and the results were quite good,” said Turkington.

Turkington received no less than 41% of the votes in the STCC rookie awards ahead of Danish Chevrolet driver Michel Nykjaer on 23% in second. Fabrizio Giovanardi, who won one of his two STCC races at Jyllandsringen, was third on 10% ahead of James Thompson on 6% and Gabriele Tarquini on 4%.

The WTCC best independent award was closer with Turkington claiming 28% of the votes, eight percent more than Darryl O’Young in second and 12% more than Norbert Michelisz in third. WTCC independent champion Kristian Poulsen was fourth on 14% of the votes ahead of Franz Engstler in fifth on 7%.
“I guess I am a bit surprised about the WTCC award, as I only did three races. But I had some good races in Japan and China and I would like to thank all the TouringCarTimes voters,” said Turkington.

Turkington finished fifth in the drivers championship in his first ever STCC season for BMW team Flash Engineering and ninth in the WTCC Yokohama Drivers’ Trophy for Wiechers Sport.