CHILTON ON BTCC POLE POSITION AT SNETTERTON
Tom Chilton has qualified on pole position for the first
of tomorrow’s (Sunday) three Dunlop MSA British Touring
Car Championship races at Snetterton, Norfolk.
Chilton, aged 20 the youngest race winner in BTCC history,
achieved his second pole position of the 2005 season in Arena
Motorsports’ Honda Civic in a time of one minute, 11.835
seconds. He was the only driver to break the 1m12s barrier.
Second fastest was Rob Collard in the WSR team’s MG
ZS, with Dan Eaves, in Team Halfords’ Honda Integra,
third. In the title race, championship leader Matt Neal, in
his Team Halfords Honda, ended up sixth, but was two positions
behind his nearest challenger Yvan Muller, fourth in Vauxhall’s
Astra Sport Hatch. Just 13 points separate them going into
tomorrow’s three races.
Chilton said: “I thought we were struggling for speed
in the earlier practice sessions, but we made a ‘feel
good’ tweak to the car and it worked a treat. Everyone
in the team drew numbers out of a hat as a bet on where I’d
qualify and my team boss Mike Earle pulled out number one
so he’s got all the money! Provided I get a good start
tomorrow, I think I’ll be gone. The car’s got
awesome race pace and I can bang in low 1m12s laps all day.
I’m quietly confident.”
Neal and Muller, meanwhile, contemplated their performances
– the pair qualified with their cars carrying the heaviest
amount of success ballast thanks to their respective championship
positions. In the last two race meetings, Muller has won three
times, but Neal has failed to take a victory.
Neal, who has never won the BTCC title, said: “I could
have probably been a bit faster but there’s no way I
could have got near Chilton’s time. But I think our
car, even with the weight, has good race pace and I’m
going all out to win. There’ll be no hanging around
to keep an eye on what Yvan’s up to.”
Muller, the 2003 BTCC champion, added: “I’m surprised
to be as high as fourth with the weight in my car and with
the long straights here – I thought we might find it
difficult. As for the championship, there’s no point
guessing what might happen in the races. But it is looking
better than I thought.”
Two drivers down in the dumps after qualifying were SEAT
Sport UK team-mates Jason Plato and James Pickford. Plato,
the 2001 BTCC champion, struggled to get on the pace in his
Toledo Cupra and was, for him, a disappointing eighth. Pickford
had been as high as sixth only to have all his times disallowed
for failing to stop at a mandatory car weigh check-point in
the pit lane.
Tomorrow’s three races at Snetterton take place at
11.10, 13.40 and 16.35. They will, as ever, be filmed by Britain’s
biggest commercial terrestrial television channel ITV1 and
shown at 12.40 next Saturday, 13 August.
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