Gordon Shedden: “It was all done at the start”

Gordon Shedden was pleased with the way his Honda Civic Type-R performed in the first race at Thruxton, managing the race from the front after launching in to the lead off the start line.

Shedden got to the front from the start after pole-sitter Aron Smith suffered a mass of wheelspin off the line. From then Shedden never looked back, followed to the flag by team-mate Matt Neal, who suffered some early pressure from Smith and Ciceley Racing’s Adam Morgan.

“It was all done at the start,” said Shedden. “Aron didn’t get off the line, I was gone by half a lap in, but immediately you’re thinking about getting the tyres to the end. Even with that kind of a gap you still don’t know if you’re going to make it or not but the car was great right to the end, so I’m dead chuffed.

Both Shedden and Neal were carrying a fair amount of success ballast, Neal carrying the maximum 75kg while Shedden 57kg worth of ballast in his car. The weight never seemed to hamper the Honda, with Shedden in complete control for the entire of the 16 lap race, stating that the clear air helped save his tyres at the notoriously tyre hungry circuit.

“To be fair the car was really good right to the end you always start hearing things around here about three of four laps from home and you think “no no no” and you just back off enough to get to the end,” he continued. “It makes a difference when you can get to the front and get some clear air we’ve seen this in years gone by when you get the whole aero effect working on the front it tends to save the tyres a bit and I could just manage what I did from halfway round lap one.”

With the grid for race two now being set on fastest laps, Shedden will line up fourth for the second race, while team-mate Neal was relegated to ninth after having his fastest lap removed for track limits.

“It’s a real difficult one with the rules this year, especially round here,” offered Shedden. “I was radioing in “what’s the lap times? What’s the lap times?” but when I got to the front with that kind of gap and I had to think of the here and now in race one to try and score the points. I couldn’t throw caution to the wind and start smashing kerbs all over the place, which obviously people have done to produce those lap times for race two. It’s going to be difficult with people up the front with a lot less weight, we’ll be stuck in the pack. So this is going to be a tough one but we’ll do what we can and see where we go for race three.”

Despite the Honda’s strong performances in the first three meetings of the season, Shedden remained coy on a potential championship challenge, warning that there’s still plenty of chances for his rivals to score big points.

“You’ve just got to keep at it,” he concluded. “There will be other circuits where lots of other cars come in to the mix, we’ve seen that again in the past. We’ll come to the next couple of rounds the BMW will be strong, couple after that the MG’ll be strong. Adam’s gone really well in the Merc and obviously you’ve got the VWs, so you’re going to get it from all angles. All we’ve got to try and do is try and score what we can as and when we can.”