Newsham targets top ten as AmDTuning.com heads for Donington BTCC

The AmDTuning.com team will seek to add to its tally of top ten finishes when the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship heads for Donington Park this weekend for the second meeting of the campaign.The West Thurrock-based team battled to a best finish of ninth during the season opener at Brands Hatch late last month, with new driver Dave Newsham scoring his first points at the wheel of the team’s new Ford Focus with a fine drive in the final race of the weekend.The Inverness-based racer will now seek to maintain that form in the East Midlands, albeit at a circuit where he has never enjoyed the best of luck in the past.Despite that, the two-time BTCC race winner said he was optimistic about his chances on track, with the AmDTuning.com team having worked hard in the time since the opening meeting to resolve some of the set-up issues that it faced in its home event.“Brands Hatch was a bit of a trying weekend in a way because we struggled with understeer in the first two races and it was only in race three that we really got the balance sorted and could give an idea of what we can do,” Dave said. “We’re going back to a tried and tested set-up for this weekend at Donington which should give us better balance from the outset, and that will hopefully allow us to hit the ground running.“Donington is a circuit that has never been kind to me in the past, even in my Clio Cup winning season, but I hope that that can change this weekend. The main aim is to make sure we pick up three finishes and hopefully if we can start the weekend the way we ended things at Brands Hatch, we'll be pushing into the top ten again.“Although we tested at Donington Park on the Media Day, we had a brake issue that meant we didn’t get chance to chase a time before it started to rain. We didn’t show our hand in the dry as a result, but at least we know we’ll have a good car if it turns out to be wet this weekend!”Having been pleased with the progress made during the team’s first weekend with the Focus at Brands Hatch, team boss Shaun Hollamby said he was keen to see his driver pushing hard for points in all three races this weekend.“While it would have been nice to get a few more points on the board at Brands Hatch, we were able to learn a lot over the course of the weekend that will benefit us moving forwards,” he said. “Dave did a great job behind the wheel and the whole team worked well together to resolve some of the problems we had, and it allowed us to take our first top ten finish of the year.“As a team, we have some good memories of Donington Park from our time running the old VW Golf and the aim is to make sure that we come away from the weekend this time around having added to those memories. The first thing is to try and bring home three points finishes, with the ultimate goal being to make sure they are all in the top ten.“Donington is also the home race for one of our sponsors, Scorpion Exhausts, so it would great if we could bring home some top ten finishes for them on home soil as well.”


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