Sport   Motorsport   Touring Cars

British Touring Car Championship
Knockhill - Free Practice - 23/8/14

By MJP Media | 23 August 2014

Colin Turkington tops the time sheets is free practice at Knockhill as the eBay Motors team show the way in the changeable weather conditions.

Colin Turkington headed the time sheets for eBay Motors

The Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship makes its annual trip north of the border with a real sense of purpose this year. It is exactly 50 years since Jim Clark won the championship and the Knockhill circuit certainly has the bunting out to celebrate the anniversary with special displays and events all weekend.

In a dry but cool opening session, it was championship leader Colin Turkington who set the pace at the head of the field. With a blistering lap time of 51.870 seconds, he was a full 0.4 of a second quicker than team-mate Rob Collard in the sister e-Bay Motors BMW 125i M Sport. Indeed, the BMWs were looking unstoppable with Nick Foster in the 3rd team car 8th into the bargain.

Rob Collard was 2nd in the first session

3rd fastest in the first session was Jason Plato in the MG KX Clubcard Fuel Save MG6 ahead of local favourite Gordon Shedden 4th and Andrew Jordan in 5th. With all three of them in with a chance of the 2014 title, they will be looking for a little extra in the second free practice session and on into qualifying.

The second free practice saw a very similar result for the eBay Motors squad, as Colin Turkington was again fastest with Nick Foster this time in 2nd with Rob Collard further down the order, but still in the top 10. Behind the two leading BMWs were both of the MGs with Sam Tordoff narrowly edging out Jason Plato for 3rd place. The Honda Yuasa Racing pairing of Gordon Shedden and Mat Neal were 5th and 6th with Rob Austin managing an excellent 7th.

Heavy rain at the end of the second session

Rounding out the top 10 were Andrew Jordan in the Pirtek Racing Honda Civic, Fabrizio Giovanardi in the Airwaves Racing Ford Focus ST and Rob Collard. Towards the end of the second session, heavy rain prevented any further improvement in lap times. The biggest disappointment in the free practice sessions was Aron Smith who, despite winning last time out, was only able to just sneak into the top 20.

As we head into this afternoon's qualifying session, the BMWs look to be favourites for pole position, however much will depend on being able to find clear track time as well as the weather. There is little doubt however that the championship challengers will all be desperate to get a good grid spot ahead of tomorrow's races. Can Colin Turkington continue his blistering form? We will see later this afternoon.

Touring Car content supplied by MJP Media