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Rockingham BTCC: Gordon Shedden dominates opener for Honda

Gordon Shedden dominated the opening British Touring Car Championship race of the weekend at Rockingham to kick-start his charge for this season's title

The 2015 winner powered his Honda Civic away from pole position in a lead he wasn't to lose, despite pressure over the opening couple of corners from Mat Jackson's Ford.

"Jackson was very close to me, particularly at the hairpin at Turn 2, but I managed to fend him off," said Shedden.

"Then, I think he had to look in his mirrors and start defending, which was the break I needed."

Even a mid-race safety car didn't put the Scot off his stride. The three-time 2016 race winner added: "At the restart, no one was bunched up behind me and the safety car had gone, so I just put my foot down and managed to stretch away.

"This is just the momentum we needed."

Jackson was forced into defensive mode as he had Jason Plato and Colin Turkington's Subarus in his wheeltracks, but the Motorbase Ford driver hung on gamely to the spot until the end.

"That was hard work," said Jackson. "Jason could get into a position to have a couple of looks, and I just had to be careful where I placed the car."

Plato finished third from Turkington. They had both zoomed ahead of the Triple Eight MG of Josh Cook away from the line to squabble over third place.

Cook finished fifth ahead of his team-mate Ashley Sutton while Jackson's Motorbase team-mate Andrew Jordan climbed through the field to seventh.

Matt Neal brought his Honda Civic home in eighth from Dave Newsham's Chevrolet, while points leader Sam Tordoff limited the damage after a poor qualifying left him 27th. He recovered to 10th.

Tordoff's WSR BMW team-mate Rob Collard also powered up the pack from 26th on the grid to claim 14th spot.

RESULTS - 18 LAPS:

Pos Driver Team Car Gap
1 Gordon Shedden Dynamics/Honda Honda 26m36.324s
2 Mat Jackson Motorbase Performance Ford 2.561s
3 Jason Plato Team BMR Subaru 2.869s
4 Colin Turkington Team BMR Subaru 3.165s
5 Josh Cook Triple Eight/MG MG 8.741s
6 Ash Sutton Triple Eight/MG MG 12.144s
7 Andrew Jordan Motorbase Performance Ford 14.072s
8 Matt Neal Dynamics/Honda Honda 18.244s
9 Dave Newsham Power Maxed Racing Chevrolet 23.899s
10 Sam Tordoff WSR BMW 24.168s
11 Aiden Moffat Laser Tools Racing Mercedes 25.086s
12 Jack Goff WSR BMW 26.423s
13 Adam Morgan Ciceley Racing Mercedes 28.526s
14 Rob Collard WSR BMW 28.994s
15 Aron Taylor-Smith Team BKR Volkswagen 29.625s
16 Tom Ingram Speedworks Motorsport Toyota 31.391s
17 Ollie Jackson AmD Tuning Audi 33.533s
18 Michael Epps Team Hard Toyota 39.864s
19 Warren Scott Team BMR Subaru 40.123s
20 Rob Austin Handy Motorsport Toyota 42.436s
21 Stewart Lines Maximum Motorsport Ford 43.295s
22 James Cole Team BMR Subaru 43.626s
23 Alex Martin Team Parker Racing Ford 46.925s
24 Tony Gilham Team Hard Toyota 50.092s
25 Jeff Smith Eurotech Racing Honda 2 Laps
26 Hunter Abbott Power Maxed Racing Chevrolet 2 Laps
- Daniel Welch Welch Motorsport Proton Retirement
- Matt Simpson Speedworks Motorsport Honda Retirement
- Jake Hill Team Hard Toyota Retirement
- Martin Depper Eurotech Racing Honda Retirement
- Mark Howard Team BKR Volkswagen Retirement


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