The eBay Motors team battled back from a tough start to Finals Day at Brands Hatch to again show its pace as the 2013 Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship season drew to close.
Heading into the season finale, the team retained an outside chance of securing the championship crown, with Colin Turkington spearheading the eBay Motors challenge alongside team-mates Rob Collard and Nick Foster.
Colin had been the highest placed of the three in qualifying to secure sixth on the grid, with Rob lining up ninth and Nick starting the opening race from 14th.
With heavy rain arriving for race day, the race one turned into something of a lottery and would end in disappointing fashion for the team when an incident at turn one saw Colin suffer a spin at Paddock Hill Bend; then being hit by Nick when he was left with nowhere to go.
The incident put both drivers out on the spot and left Rob on his own to fly the flag for the team, taking the flag in a solid seventh place.
Misfortune would then hit Rob in race two when contact from the Ford of Aron Smith saw him spin at Surtees on the second lap. While he was able to rejoin the race, the time lost saw him cross the line down in 14th, two places behind Colin who worked his way through to twelfth from the back of the grid.
For Nick, the wet conditions were made even more challenging by the fact that his car started to steam up as the race wore on, leading to him being forced to pit to allow the team to clear the windscreen. As such, he ended the race a lap down in 18th place.
Continuing rain meant conditions on track were as difficult as ever for the final race of the weekend, but a fine performance from Colin saw him rewarded with a fourth place finish that saw him secure fifth in the end of season standings and second amongst the Independents.
Rob secured his third points finish of the day in eighth having found himself stuck behind the Toyota of Adam Morgan as he tried to work his way through the pack, leaving him 13th in the championship and eighth amongst the Independents.
Nick meanwhile showed his pace as he lapped quicker than a number of the top ten, but fell just shy of picking up points in 16th place, which leaves him 15th in the end of season reckoning and eleventh amongst the Independents.
As a team, eBay Motors ends its first season running its all-new NGTC-spec BMW 125i M-Sports in a highly impressive third place in the HiQ Teams’ Championship behind the works Honda and MG teams, both of whom were racing their current cars for a second year.
Colin Turkington (R/12th/4th): “It’s been a really difficult way to end the year. I think we’d have been in better shape if it had been dry as the car was an unknown quantity round here in the wet, and the GP circuit is a real challenge in those conditions. It really took us until the third race to get the balance sorted in the car and that is the positive for us to take away from the weekend; that we found some strong performance in those conditions.
“Coming into the weekend, my aim was to try and wrap up third in the championship standings which sadly we weren’t able to achieve. However, to be fifth with a brand new car is still something we can be pleased with.”
Rob Collard (7th/14th/8th): “It’s been a hard way to end the year. Race one was where we expected to be in terms of the result, but to then be hit in race two was almost the story of my season; I’ve lost count of the number of times that something in the second race has put me on the back foot. When I was then stuck in traffic in race three, I couldn’t have got any higher.
“I knew at the start of the year that it wasn’t going to be easy this season with a new car and we’ve certainly had some challenges along the way. There is no doubt that it’s been tough, but the positive for me is that we’ve been on the pace and closer to the mix in the final rounds, which is promising for the future.”
Nick Foster (R/18th/16th): “I really enjoyed the final race and showed decent pace, but it’s just a shame about what happened in the first two races. There was nothing I could do with the incident in race one and then when the window steamed up in race two, I could see even less in the rain!
“Overall it’s been a hard season and while I’ve not managed to get what I wanted in terms of the end result, I’ve really enjoyed the challenge. I had to get used to a new car and the team has done a great job making improvements over the course of the year. I think there is still more to come from it in future.”
