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Rob Collard leads opening British Touring Car practice session at Brands Hatch

Rob Collard topped the first British Touring Car session of 2012 with his turbocharged WSR BMW at Brands Hatch on Saturday morning

Rob Austin's rear-wheel-drive NGTC Audi A4 set the pace in the early part of the session before the BMW, now running a Neil Brown-prepared turbo unit for the first time, set a time of 48.932s.

Collard's new WSR team-mate Tom Onlsow-Cole was third, despite a small technical problem.

Andrew Jordan was the quickest of the new NGTC cars, taking fourth in Eurotech's Honda Civic. His 49.270s effort was also the best front-wheel-drive time.

Mat Jackson (Motorbase Ford Focus), Dave Newsham (ES Racing Vauxhall Vectra) and Aron Smith (Motorbase) made it five S2000 chassis in the top seven.

Reigning champion Matt Neal was 11th as many of the new cars played themselves in slowly, his 49.915s lap in the Honda being 1.7s off his pole time from last year.

The new works MG6s of Andy Neate and Jason Plato were 19th and 20th respectively, while 2011 championship runner-up Gordon Shedden suffered intermittent cut-out problems with his new NGTC Honda Civic. One such cut-out caused the first red flag of the season and Shedden ended up 21st.

John Thorne's Vauxhall Insignia caused the second red flag when he crashed at Paddock, while Ollie Jackson's off in the AmD VW Golf at the same place brought the session to an end.

Pos  Driver           Team/Car           Time     Gap
 1.  Rob Collard      WSR BMW            48.932s
 2.  Rob Austin       Austin Audi        49.129s  + 0.197s
 3.  Tom Onslow-Cole  WSR BMW            49.259s  + 0.327s
 4.  Andrew Jordan    Eurotech Honda     49.270s  + 0.338s
 5.  Mat Jackson      Motorbase Ford     49.276s  + 0.344s
 6.  Dave Newsham     ES Vauxhall        49.333s  + 0.401s
 7.  Aron Smith       Motorbase Ford     49.706s  + 0.774s
 8.  Frank Wrathall   Dynojet Toyota     49.714s  + 0.782s
 9.  Nick Foster      WSR BMW            49.751s  + 0.819s
10.  Adam Morgan      Speedworks Toyota  49.772s  + 0.840s
11.  Matt Neal        Dynamics Honda     49.915s  + 0.983s
12.  Chris James      ES Vauxhall        49.960s  + 1.028s
13.  Liam Griffin     Motorbase Ford     49.989s  + 1.057s
14.  Ollie Jackson    AmD Volkswagen     50.033s  + 1.101s
15.  Jeff Smith       Eurotech Honda     50.360s  + 1.428s
16.  Lea Wood         Wood Vauxhall      50.380s  + 1.448s
17.  Daniel Welch     Welch Proton       50.573s  + 1.641s
18.  John Thorne      Thorney Vauxhall   51.198s  + 2.266s
19.  Andy Neate       Triple 8 MG        52.932s  + 4.000s
20.  Jason Plato      Triple 8 MG        53.163s  + 4.231s
21.  Gordon Shedden   Dynamics Honda     54.925s  + 5.993s
22.  Tony Gilham      Gilham Honda

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