Rob Austin looking for a change in fortunes

Rob Austin is hoping the long summer break and two-day test at Snetterton will help him turn his fortunes around in the 2013 season.

Hard-charging Austin finished 13th, 14th and 11th at Croft in his Audi A4, and has described the lack of pace as “a bit of a mystery.”

He says his Rob Austin Racing team now plan to strip everything out of the car to ensure it is in perfect working order.

Austin said: “In all three races at Croft we were scratching around not far off the top ten but I believe we should have been inside the top ten.

“OK, I screwed up in race two with an off which dropped me back when maybe a top ten was on, but when it comes to raw pace it’s left us scratching our heads a bit.

“Sure, this is only our third season in the BTCC and I appreciate we’re up against teams with almost 20 years of touring car experience, considerably bigger budgets and more resources, but still we should be closer to them as we demonstrated at the start of the season.

“We’ve got the big summer break now so we’ll use it wisely and get to the bottom of why. We’re also spending a lot of time back at base stripping and triple-checking every component as well the general lay-out of the car and, if we find anything, working on any modifications.”

Austin is hoping the Snetterton test will help improve both single-lap qualifying pace, and speed over a race distance.

He said: “Snetterton is very important for two key reasons. Firstly it’s a rare chance to go testing while the season is on so we need to use it to move our performance on, just as every one else will be aiming to do. Bear in mind compared to many of the other teams we’ve had virtually no testing at all this year.

“Secondly Snetterton is where the season gets going again in early August so there’s a chance to get the car dialled into the track lay-out so we hit the ground running.”