New winner Adam Morgan: “The car was on rails”

The BTCC’s newest winner Adam Morgan said his Mercedes A-Class felt like it was “on rails” in the second race at Brands Hatch, with his victory meaning a record 11 different drivers have stood on top of the podium in 2014.

Ciceley Racing’s Morgan drove an outstanding race to battle through to the lead, only to slip back to second behind Jason Plato when he ran wide at Sheene Curve with three laps to go.

But the Triple Eight man was belatedly punished with a time penalty for an incident with Colin Turkington earlier in the race, meaning Morgan learned of his victory just minutes before heading to the grid for the last race.

Assessing the win, Morgan told TouringCarTimes: “It’s good and bad…it’s great to finally get a win, but we didn’t go about it as planned. You live and learn – it was the first time I’d led a race this year, and not that I’m making excuses, but I’d had a bit of pad knock-off. I had a long pedal and carried too much speed in.

“At the end of the day, we knew how quick the car was, and we had the pace to do it.

“One of the elements we’ve worked on this year is the high-speed corners. The car is really balanced and I’m able to carry the speed through.

“That second race, I’ve never driven a car so good. It was on rails, and lasted the whole race on the tyres. Hats off to everyone at the team, and my engineer Paul [Ridgeway].”

Morgan is already looking forward to 2015, and says his deal to be on the grid is virtually in place already. He is setting loftier ambitions for himself next time around.

He said: “We know we’ve found a sweet spot in the dry, we know we’ve found the pace. We’re nearly there in the wet. Realistically, I’m aiming for top five in the championship.”

On his participation, and the prospect of the team expanding, he added: “We’re 95 per cent there – a few more meetings, and we’ll be back out. Back at the unit we do have an A-Class with a cage in it. We’ve got a second car, we’re still waiting for a license, then we can get a second driver in it and away we go.”