Why a BTCC 'joker' trial isn't the answer to 2019's racing
The 2019 BTCC season has hardly been a classic, but it played host to a 'joker' experiment last time out at Snetterton that won praise, but is it the answer to improving the racing?
It's become expected of the British Touring Car Championship to produce breathless racing. But out of the 18 races so far this season, 10 have been won by the polesitter.
That number has been skewed by the introduction of the BMW 330i M Sport, responsible for seven of the light-to-flag victories. But, throughout the pack, the racing so far in 2019 hasn't been vintage.
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Matt Kew is Autosport’s F1 Editor, a role he has held since March 2022 following stints covering Formula E, Extreme E and the British Touring Car Championship.
Matt joined Autosport in 2018 to work predominantly on the magazine, but his relentless quoting of Alan Partridge meant office colleagues soon thought he would be better-suited to increased field work.
Needless to say, Matt had the last laugh when he won the Motorsport UK Young Journalist of the Year Award in 2019.
His interest in motorsport was sparked by regular trips to watch ASCAR crash around Rockingham’s banked oval.
Matt read politics and philosophy at the University of Sheffield - receiving first-class honours for his dissertation assessing the lack of female participation in top-tier motor racing.
He covered a wide variety of national race and rally meetings for Autosport as a freelancer before joining full-time. His best efforts to argue the merits of historic racing are undone by a questionable taste in music and James Bond actors.
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