Front row target for Mat Jackson at Silverstone

Mat Jackson is targeting a front row result in qualifying at Silverstone after setting the only sub-59 second lap time in the morning’s opening practice session.

Jackson jumped to the top of the standings near the end of the 40 minute practice, posting a time of 58.952, but feels there is still more to come from the car, which he says will be vital for a top qualifying result in the afternoon.

“The car clearly is working well but it’s early days,” Jackson told TouringCarTimes. “We ran old tyres, we don’t know what everyone else has done. I’m sure some of the title guys will sort it out in the next one. It’s good for us, we’re in the window but I suspect that pole will be a low 58, we’ve got to wait and see.”

The Ford Focus has been strong in the opening races in the past two events, starring in both opening races at Knockhill and Rockingham, but Jackson knows that a strong qualifying result will be vital to continuing their run of form at Silverstone.

“Qualifying is key,” he continued. “We need to make sure we’re up there. We’ve got the luxury of not carrying any weight in to qualifying which gives us an advantage. For race one if we can be on the front row by the end of the day then when battle resumes hopefully we can battle for a podium. That’s what we’re here for, we’ve made that quite clear and there’s a lot of work going in to the car to make it faster. Hopefully before the end of the day we’ll be somewhere near where we’re hoping to be.”