Photo: PSP Images

Ollie Jackson survives 12.5G impact with tree

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Ollie Jackson was one of a trio of drivers to suffer a big off at Thruxton’s daunting Church corner, walking away from a 12.5G, 95mph impact with a large tree, which snapped it in half.

The Welch Motorsport man suffered a failure in Sunday’s final race, causing heavy front-end damage to his new Proton Gen-2.

Along with Simon Belcher, Jackson was another driver left ruing the lack of a gravel trap at Church.

Speaking to TouringCarTimes, Jackson said: “I went over the crest of Church and something failed. The car went absolutely dead straight.

“There’s no gravel traps or proper barriers, so I just went straight across the grass and into a tree. I snapped it in half.

“I’ve got a few cuts and bruises where I bashed my legs, but I’m otherwise OK. I’m fairly robustly built!”

Assessing the damage to his car, Jackson added: “We’re hoping the shell is repairable, but the engine’s a write-off and the whole front subframe is a write-off. It’s whether the shell has twisted or not – we’re hoping it’s localised damage to the cage, which we can repair.

“We should be OK (for Oulton) but it depends on the workload.”