Andrew Herron returned to the ELF Renault Clio Cup championship top three at Oulton Park Island Circuit Saturday, 30th May, after securing his sixth top four finish of the 2009 season.
The 20-year-old, who lives in Dromore, Co. Down, qualified fourth on the grid for the seventh round of the campaign with a time of 1m35.189 seconds (84.18mph). The race itself proved to be very uneventful for Andrew and although he was always within just a few 10ths of a second of third placed Dave Newsham, he wasn't able to make a decisive attempt at a pass.
Maintaining fourth position into the first corner, Old Hall, on lap one, the JHR Developments driver immediately pressurised Newsham as he strived for yet another podium finish but the order of the top four remained static for the entire race.
Disappointed to have missed out on his fifth podium of the year, Andrew was still happy to have secured an additional 22 points for his championship total meaning he is now in third place overall, just 14 points behind second placed Alex MacDowall.
Speaking on the race, he said: "We were struggling with braking into the hairpin, we lost a lot of time there every lap which meant I had to work to get the time back over the rest of the lap. There wasn't that much between me and (Dave) Newsham and I am disappointed not to have taken third place.
"Oulton Park isn't my best track so I suppose taking a fourth place today isn't bad at all. We've still managed to move up the championship so that's good. At the start of the year I looked at Brands Hatch and Oulton Park as the two tracks where I'd probably get my worst results so considering that, we're not in too bad shape."
"If I can get another top four tomorrow I'll be very happy but it's going to be tough, starting seventh on the grid is far from ideal but we'll give it a good go. Anything can happen in Clios so we'll be pushing to do as well as we can. If we can keep third in the championship, I'll be pleased."
Round eight is timetabled to take place at 15.50 Sunday, 31st May, and will be screened live across the UK on ITV4 - channel 28 on Freeview, cable channel 117 and on Sky Digital at channel 120.
