Collard wins Donington race three

The Motorbase BMW driver shot off the line from his front row grid position to grab the lead at the first corner of a race that began on a wet, but drying track, and never lost it.

Behind him drama unfolded as polesitter Harry Vaulkhard fought tooth-and-nail with Fabrizio Giovanardi and Jason Plato for the podium spots during the first half of the race.

Neither Vaulkhard nor Giovanardi would stand on it at the end of the race though, the Tempus Chevrolet and works Vauxhall coming together at McLeans on lap 13 in an incident that resulted in the Italian spinning and Vaulkhard losing time.

Plato capitalised on the incident to go past, but he and RML Chevrolet team-mate Mat Jackson were both passed by Colin Turkington at the following corner as the WSR BMW driver grabbed second place by the chequered flag. Plato and Jackson finished next up with Giovanardi fifth.

Sixth went to James Thompson, who had won both earlier races. Team Dynamics took a gamble by fitting slick tyres to the front end of his Honda while most of the rest of the field went for wets on each corner.

The gamble did not look to be paying off as he spent the first half of race at the back of the field.

However, as the track dried out, so his pace improved, and with lap times around three seconds quicker than the wet-shod cars by the closing stages, he was able to move up the field, passing Vaulkhard for sixth out of the final corner on the last lap.

Vauxhall's Matt Neal now has a reduced 13 point lead championship lead after finishing eighth, while Tom Chilton gave the Arena Ford team its first points of the year in ninth and Dave Pinkney completed the top 10 for Team Dynamics.

Pos  Driver               Car        Time
 1.  Rob Collard          BMW        22m09.601s
 2.  Colin Turkington     BMW         +  1.201s
 3.  Jason Plato          Chevrolet   +  3.639s
 4.  Mat Jackson          Chevrolet   +  3.794s
 5.  Fabrizio Giovanardi  Vauxhall    +  8.325s
 6.  James Thompson       Honda       + 10.321s
 7.  Harry Vaulkhard      Chevrolet   + 10.339s
 8.  Matt Neal            Vauxhall    + 14.133s
 9.  Tom Chilton          Ford        + 22.951s
10.  David Pinkney        Honda       + 23.448s
11.  Andrew Jordan        Vauxhall    + 24.544s
12.  Martin Johnson       Vauxhall    + 27.136s
13.  Jonathan Adam        BMW         + 28.815s
14.  Liam McMillan        SEAT        + 29.258s
15.  Alan Morrison        Ford        + 33.888s
16.  Paul O'Neill         Honda       + 35.880s
17.  John George          Honda       + 36.610s
18.  Nick Leason          BMW         +   1 lap
19.  Martyn Bell          Honda       +  2 laps

Retirements:

     Adam Jones           SEAT       0 laps