Gordon Shedden taking the positives from bruising return

Gordon Shedden is taking the positives from what was an otherwise bruising return to the British Touring Car Championship at Donington Park last weekend.

Making his debut with Speedworks Motorsport in the Toyota Corolla GR Sport, the three-time champion qualified in 13th on Saturday before then finding himself in the thick of the action.

After being forced to make an unscheduled trip into pit lane to address some flailing bodywork in the opening encounter, the Scotsman went on to finish in the points in races two and three.

Reflecting on the weekend, Shedden said: “It feels like I’ve never been away! We should have been further up the grid in qualifying; we lacked a little bit of balance and the set-up wasn’t quite where we had expected it to be, and Sunday obviously wasn’t the best day either.

“The level in the championship is so high now, that if you start further down the order, it’s tough to battle through. I got driven into left, right and centre, but when we had a clean run, you could see we’ve got some genuine pace in race trim.

“We clearly need to do a better job in qualifying, but the biggest positive from Donington is that we definitely made the car better as the weekend progressed, so hopefully we can carry that momentum forward with us to Brands Hatch and start off on a stronger footing from the outset.”