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British Touring Car Championship
Thruxton - Qualifying - 3/5/14

By MJP Media | 3 May 2014

Andrew Jordan takes pole position for Pirtek Racing as Honda dominates qualifying at Thruxton.

Andrew Jordan dominated all the sessions today at Thruxton
Andrew Jordan dominated all the sessions today at Thruxton

As the sun continued to shine at Thruxton, Aron Smith failed to make it out for the start of the qualifying session after his crash earlier in the day but hoped to get out later. Due to the exceptional nature of the high speed Thruxton circuit, all the cars have to run the special hard Dunlop tyre at all times so there is no change for qualifying or any of the races. This year sees a new rule for qualifying where fast laps will only count if the car has its lights on - an innovation designed so that spectators can see who is on a quick lap.

Andrew Jordon set the early pace in his Pirtek Racing Honda Civic, building on his domination of free practice with Gordon Shedden 2nd for Honda Yuasa Racing and Mat Jackson putting a great lap together in his Ford Focus ST to go into 3rd for Airwaves Racing. Sam Tordoff in the MG KX Clubcard Fuel Save MG6 got himself up to 4th ahead of Matt Neal and team-mate Jason Plato, however with Tordoff outside the top 5 in the championship, he ran ballast free.

Matt Neal being followed by Gordon Shedden
Matt Neal being followed by Gordon Shedden

At the midway stage, Matt Neal put in a blinding lap in his Honda Yuasa Racing Civic Tourer to go second and with it, put in the fastest second sector time of anyone.

In the top three spots as the session came to an end it was Andrew Jordan 1st, Gordon Shedden 2nd and Matt Neal 3rd - all for Honda. Mat Jackson ended the session in 4th with Tom Ingram the highest placed Toyota in 5th and the two MGs of Jason Plato and Sam Tordoff in 6th and 7th. Rob Collard, Alain Menu and Adam Morgan rounded out the top ten.

Mat Jackson's Airwaves Racing Ford Focus ST
Mat Jackson's Airwaves Racing Ford Focus ST

Disappointed drivers were Exocet Racing's Rob Austin and AlcoSense Breathalysers Racing's Hunter Abbot down in 21st and 22nd with their Audi A4s along with Colin Turkington who ended the session down in 13th and Fabrizio Giovanardi who ended in 12th. Aron Smith managed to make it out on track but failed to post a qualifying lap time in his Chrome Edition Restart Racing Volkswagen CC.

As we look forward to the first race tomorrow, it is a 1-2-3 lock-out at the front of the grid for Honda and it looks like their domination of the weekend will continue.

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