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Neal leads Halfords 1-2-3

Matt Neal moved a big step closer to a second consecutive British Touring Car Championship title by leading a Team Halfords one-two-three sweep in race three at Knockhill

But the race should have belonged to Team RAC's Colin Turkington, who was clearly the fastest man on the track as he charged through from ninth on the grid.

By lap 10 Turkington was on the tail of Neal and teammate Gareth Howell, grabbing second into the hairpin four laps later.

Howell managed to regain the place at the same spot when Turkington focused a little too hard on attacking Neal on lap 16, but within a lap the now bio-ethanol fuelled MG ZS was back through to second.

Turkington then muscled past Neal into the hairpin next time around and seemed certain of victory, only for the car to start cutting out shortly afterwards.

The Halfords Hondas swept back through as Turkington slowed and eventually retired.

Meanwhile Gordon Shedden had been coming through the field from 13th and catching his teammates. Both Howell and Neal pulled aside and allowed Shedden past so he could gain the bonus point for leading a lap, before the local star dropped back into second and followed Neal home.

With Turkington retiring and Jason Plato unable to start due to the damage his SEAT sustained in race two, Neal now has an enormous 53 point championship lead with six rounds remaining.

"The team's had a big day today," said Neal. "It's been fairly fraught at times, so to take our first ever one-two-three is fantastic."

Darren Turner progressed from the back of the grid to fourth ahead of Gavin Smith, with the Vauxhalls no match for the other leaders in this race. Fabrizio Giovanardi salvaged sixth - surviving a punt from Rob Collard in the closing stages.

Mark Proctor had drawn the pole position but lost the lead to Neal at the start. He was then bundled down the order before coming home eighth in what may be his last appearance of 2006.

Another star privateer was Kartworld MG man Jason Hughes, who briefly ran second to Neal before slipping down the field and eventually retiring with mechanical problems.

CLASSIFIED:

Pos  Driver               Make                        Time
 1.  Matt Neal            Honda Integra               25:34.880
 2.  Gordon Shedden       Honda Integra               +   0.144
 3.  Gareth Howell        Honda Integra               +   0.646
 4.  Darren Turner        SEAT Leon                   +   5.268
 5.  Gavin Smith          Vauxhall Astra Sport Hatch  +   8.364
 6.  Fabrizio Giovanardi  Vauxhall Astra Sport Hatch  +  18.061
 7.  Robert Collard       MG ZS                       +  18.662
 8.  Mark Proctor         Honda Civic Type R          +  25.371
 9.  David Pinkney        Honda Integra               +  33.138
10.  Martyn Bell          BMW 320i E46                +  38.691

NOT CLASSIFIED/RETIREMENTS:

     Driver               Make                        On Lap
     Colin Turkington     MG ZS                         20 
     Jason Hughes         MG ZS                         11 
     Richard Marsh        Peugeot 307                    3 
     Tom Chilton          Vauxhall Astra Sport Hatch     1 

Fastest Lap: Gordon Shedden, 53.311 on lap 11

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