Giovanardi wins tight race 3

The Italian, who claimed Vauxhall's long-awaited 100th BTCC win last time out at Knockhill, capitalised on teammate Tom Chilton's gearbox problems to take the lead with two laps to go.

Chilton, who had a queue of five cars chasing him, got out of shape in Clearways, allowing the Italian to get ahead. Chilton then came under attack from Team Dynamics's Gordon Shedden, who challenged at Paddock and passed Chilton on the run to Druids.

Teammate Matt Neal attempted to follow him through, but Chilton turned in and flicked the orange machine into the air and into the gravel trap.

With Giovanardi and Shedden assured of first and second, SEAT's Jason Plato, who had won the first two races of the day, had a grandstand seat of his title rival going into the gravel, and went on to take valuable points for third place. He now heads to the Silverstone finale still in with a chance of the title, although the 35 point gap will be difficult to overcome.

Colin Turkington capped a solid weekend with fourth place, although the WSR driver's chances of challenging for the title are now as good as over. The Northern Irisman, along with the third Dynamics Integra of Gareth Howell and the second MG ZS of Rob Collard completed the top six.

Mike Jordan salvaged a seventh place from a weekend that had promised a great deal in terms of pace, but was undermined by gearbox problems, despite starting from the back of the grid, pipping the ailing Chilton in the closing stages.

Jason Hughes ran with the front-runners throughout the race, taking a strong ninth place ahead of Gavin Smith's Vauxhall Astra Sport Hatch.

The race was interrupted in the early stages by the safety car after Chris Stockton had clashed with the Motorbase Performance Integra of Dave Pinkney at the first corner.

Stockton, who had starred in the first two races in the BTC Racing Lexus IS200, had suffered a ball joint failure which pitched him into the ever-luckless Pinkney.

CLASSIFIED:

Pos  Driver               Make                        Time
 1.  Fabrizio Giovanardi  Vauxhall Astra Sport Hatch  25:26.598
 2.  Gordon Shedden       Honda Integra               +   0.358
 3.  Jason Plato          SEAT Leon                   +   0.609
 4.  Colin Turkington     MG ZS                       +   0.973
 5.  Gareth Howell        Honda Integra               +   2.663
 6.  Robert Collard       MG ZS                       +   3.624
 7.  Mike Jordan          Honda Integra               +   4.158
 8.  Tom Chilton          Vauxhall Astra Sport Hatch  +   5.062
 9.  Jason Hughes         MG ZS                       +   7.843
10.  Gavin Smith          Vauxhall Astra Sport Hatch  +  13.427
11.  Paul O'Neill         Vauxhall Astra Coupe        +  13.669
12.  Adam Jones           Lexus IS200                 +  25.757
13.  Martyn Bell          BMW 320i E46                +  30.867
14.  Mark Smith           Alfa Romeo 156              +  43.828
15.  Darren Dowling       Lexus IS200                 +  47.621
16.  Mark Jones           Lexus IS200                 +   1 lap

NOT CLASSIFIED/RETIREMENTS:

     Driver               Make                        On Lap
     Matt Neal            Honda Integra                 24
     James Kaye           Honda Civic Type R            10
     Chris Stockton       Lexus IS200                    0
     David Pinkney        Honda Integra                  0

Fastest Lap: Tom Chilton, 49.852 on lap 11