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British Touring Car Championship
Rockingham - Free Practice - 5/9/15

By MJP Media | 5 September 2015

Andrew Jordan and Tom Ingram lead the way in free practice at Rockingham as Honda Yuasa Racing and JCT600 Racing with GardX struggle around the Northamptonshire circuit.

Andrew Jordan tops the time sheets in the 2nd practice session

With the ever present threat of rain, the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship took to the track at Northamptonshire's Rockingham circuit for the first of two free practice sessions for the 8th meeting of the 2015 season. Team BMR RCIB Insurance's Jason Plato leads the Drivers' Championship by just 11 points over the Honda Yuasa Racing duo of Gordon Shedden and Matt Neal with defending BTCC champion Colin Turkington 4th just 28 points behind team-mate Plato.

Returning to the BTCC for the Rockingham meeting is Nick Foster who is driving the Team IHG Rewards Club BMW 125i M Sport while regular driver Andy Priaulx is absent due to other BMW racing commitments made before he signed up to the BTCC. In what proved to be a cold and damp first session, Tom Ingram in the Speedworks Motorsport Toyota Avensis topped the time sheet with an unrepresentative lap time of 1:24.135. Behind Ingram were the Power Maxed Racing pair of Dave Newsham and Josh Cook in their Chevrolet Cruzes with Adam Morgan and Aron Smith completing the top 5.

Tom Ingram excels in his Speedworks Motorsport Toyota Avensis

Interestingly, Colin Turkington in his Team BMR RCIB Insurance Volkswagen CC was the only one of the main championship title contenders to post a time in the top 10. Whilst this may not be indicative of true performance, it will give the Irishman renewed confidence for the rest of the weekend. Although taking to the track during the session, Jason Plato, Andrew Jordan and Mat Jackson failed to complete a timed lap.

For the second free practice session the dark clouds had cleared and there were brief periods of sunshine to warm the track. Any worries about Jason Plato and Andrew Jordan not putting in a flying lap in the first session were soon dispelled with Plato posting the 3rd fastest lap time in the second session with Jordan posting the fastest time in his MG 888 Racing MG 6GT. Tom Ingram continued his run of good from by going 2nd fastest for Speedworks Motorsport, just 0.009 seconds off Jordan's time.

JCT600 Racing with GardX struggled in the 2nd session

Jack Goff posted the 4th fastest time of the second session in his MG 6GT with Power Maxed Racing's Josh Cook 5th and Honda Yuasa Racing's Gordon Shedden 6th in his Honda Civic Type R. Aron Smith, Dave Newsham, Colin Turkington and Mat Jackson completed the top 10. Demonstrating he was the right choice to replace Andy Priaulx, Nick Foster in the Team IHG Rewards Club car was the fastest of the West Surrey Racing prepared BMWs in 11th place with team-mates Sam Tordoff and Rob Collard 14th and 15th respectively in their JCT600 Racing with GardX cars.

Matt Neal struggled around the 1.94 mile circuit, managing only 24th in the first session and 16th in the second. Also having a challenging time was Rob Austin whose 2 BTCC victories have been at Rockingham. Austin was 26th in the first session and 18th in the second in his Exocet AlcoSense Audi A4. The next BTCC action from Rockingham is the qualifying session later this afternoon to determine the grid for the first race tomorrow.

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