Colin Turkington (Portadown) has qualified on pole position for tomorrow’s Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship starting grid at the Oulton Park circuit in Cheshire. The 25-year-old becomes the first driver in 2007 to take two pole positions and his achievement follows his first win of the season last time out at the Croft circuit three weeks ago.
Turkington, driving a BMW 320si for Team RAC, set pole with a time of 1m28.534s. Second fastest, just 0.054s adrift after a string of rapid laps at the end of the session, was Scottish driver Gordon Shedden (Dalgety Bay) in his Team Halfords Honda Civic. The session, though, was a bitter-sweet affair for Team RAC as Turkington’s team-mate Tom Onslow-Cole (New Malden) crashed on his second flying lap and was left in an eventual 18th overall on the 24-car grid.
Third and fourth were Shedden’s team-mate, the reigning champion Matt Neal (Droitwich) and SEAT’s Darren Turner (Leamington-Spa) – the latter eager for more success after achieving his first win in the BTCC at Croft and, last weekend, a victory in the Le Mans 24 Hours sports car race. Fifth and sixth fastest were the two championship leaders, SEAT’s Jason Plato (Oxford) and Vauxhall’s Italian ace Fabrizio Giovanardi. They will therefore line up alongside one another on the third row of the grid and, with just two points separating them, a fierce battle for supremacy is expected on the track tomorrow.
Of note, Adam Jones, who has missed the last two BTCC meetings, qualified an excellent eighth fastest on his return at the wheel of his Team Air Cool SEAT Toledo.
Top ten qualifying times, BTCC Oulton Park (provisional):
Pos. Driver (NAT), Team/Car, Time1. Colin Turkington (GBR), Team RAC/BMW 320si E90, 1m28.534s
2. Gordon Shedden (GBR), Team Halfords/Honda Civic, +0.054ss
3. Matt Neal (GBR), Team Halfords/Honda Civic, +0.133ss
4. Darren Turner (GBR), SEAT Sport UK/SEAT Leon, +0.403s5. Jason Plato (GBR), SEAT Sport UK/SEAT Leon, +0.455s6. Fabrizio Giovanardi (ITA), VX Racing/Vauxhall Vectra, +0.524s7. Mike Jordan (GBR), Eurotech-John Guest-Speedfit/Honda Integra, +0.619s8. Adam Jones (GBR), Team Air Cool/SEAT Toledo, +0.637s
9. Mat Jackson (GBR), Jacksons MSport/BMW 320si E90, +0.674s10. Tom Chilton (GBR), VX Racing/Vauxhall Vectra, +0.757s
