BTCC Brands Hatch: Hondas dominate as Jack Goff heads FP2 order
Hondas dominated the top of the timesheets during the second free practice session ahead of this weekend's opening rounds of the British Touring Car Championship, as Jack Goff went quickest
Six of the top seven positions were locked out by the Civic Type R, despite Tom Ingram's Speedworks Toyota topping the earlier practice session.
Eurotech Racing man Goff put his Civic Type R on top of the pile with a 48.295s lap, which put him narrowly ahead of his team-mate Brett Smith.
Goff, who was second in FP1, said: "It's great to be this fast, and we were quicker than we were earlier, but I still haven't found the perfect lap.
"There was some more time to come from me and there is more to come from the car."
Smith said: "We had a little problem in FP1 with some technical issues and we didn't get too much mileage, but that last session was great.
"We did a qualifying simulation in FP2 and felt comfortable and I feel there is more in the car to come.
"To be less than one tenth of a second from my team-mate is a good feeling too and I think a sub-48s lap could be on the cards for qualifying this afternoon."
The new-shape Team Dynamics Civic Type R of Dan Cammish was third fastest, ahead of the only non-Honda interloper, FP1 pace setter Ingram, in the Toyota Avensis.
Matt Neal's Team Dynamics car was fifth ahead of the Simpson Motorsport Type R of Matt Simpson.
Neal said that the team was still looking for performance from the FK8 version of the Civic but he was encouraged by the early mileage.
"We are just trying to work out a different way to skin a cat in terms of the set-up," explained the three-time title winner.
"Ours has a little bit too much understeer at the moment, and we know that isn't so much of an issue in the older-spec cars all around us in the timesheets.
"We have set-up routes to go down though to try and get to the bottom of it."
The Team BMR Subaru Levorg of Ash Sutton had a set-up alteration which the reigning title holder said did not work. He finished in 25th spot.
The 2017 championship runner-up Colin Turkington missed a chunk of track time with a water pump failure on his WSR BMW 125i M Sport. He finished 26th.
FP2 times
| Pos | Driver | Team | Car | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jack Goff | Eurotech Racing | Honda | 48.295s |
| 2 | Brett Smith | Eurotech Racing | Honda | 0.075s |
| 3 | Dan Cammish | Team Dynamics | Honda | 0.098s |
| 4 | Tom Ingram | Speedworks | Toyota | 0.165s |
| 5 | Matt Neal | Team Dynamics | Honda | 0.226s |
| 6 | Chris Smiley | BTC Norlin | Honda | 0.336s |
| 7 | Matt Simpson | Eurotech Racing | Honda | 0.404s |
| 8 | James Cole | Motorbase | Ford | 0.435s |
| 9 | Josh Cook | Power Maxed Racing | Vauxhall | 0.437s |
| 10 | Senna Proctor | Power Maxed Racing | Vauxhall | 0.440s |
| 11 | Aiden Moffat | Laser Tools Racing | Mercedes | 0.468s |
| 12 | Stephen Jelley | Team Parker Racing | BMW | 0.469s |
| 13 | Andrew Jordan | WSR | BMW | 0.472s |
| 14 | Adam Morgan | Ciceley Motorsport | Mercedes | 0.477s |
| 15 | Mike Bushell | Team Hard | Volkswagen | 0.483s |
| 16 | Tom Oliphant | Ciceley Motorsport | Mercedes | 0.520s |
| 17 | Sam Tordoff | Motorbase | Ford | 0.536s |
| 18 | Rob Austin | HMS Racing | Alfa Romeo | 0.582s |
| 19 | Ollie Jackson | AmD Tuning | Audi | 0.636s |
| 20 | Tom Chilton | Motorbase | Ford | 0.656s |
| 21 | Rory Butcher | AmD Tuning | MG | 0.699s |
| 22 | James Nash | BTC Norlin | Honda | 0.701s |
| 23 | Michael Caine | Team Hard | Volkswagen | 0.708s |
| 24 | Tom Boardman | AmD Tuning | MG | 0.763s |
| 25 | Ash Sutton | Team BMR | Subaru | 0.771s |
| 26 | Colin Turkington | WSR | BMW | 0.792s |
| 27 | Jake Hill | Team Hard | Volkswagen | 0.816s |
| 28 | Jason Plato | Team BMR | Subaru | 0.827s |
| 29 | Rob Collard | WSR | BMW | 0.878s |
| 30 | Bobby Thompson | Team Hard | Volkswagen | 0.916s |
| 31 | Sam Smelt | AmD Tuning | Audi | 1.073s |
| 32 | Josh Price | Team BMR | Subaru | 1.154s |
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