Plato wins again in race two
Jason Plato continued the strong start to his British Touring Car Championship title defence with a second victory at Brands Hatch this afternoon
Plato's RML Chevrolet Cruze made a good getaway to lead into Paddock Hill Bend, while the fast-starting Mat Jackson completed a great move around the outside of James Nash's Triple 8 Engineering Vauxhall Vectra to secure second.
Nash got sideways trying to defend the move, allowing Plato's team-mate Alex MacDowall through.
After a brief safety car period, caused by a clash between Tom Onslow-Cole (AmD Milltek VW Golf) and Tom Boardman (Special Tuning SEAT Leon), Gordon Shedden powered past the ballasted Nash to move his Honda Racing Civic into fourth. That became third when MacDowall was given a drivethrough penalty for jumping the start.
Jackson initially put Plato under a lot of pressure, but Shedden's pace allowed him to catch the lead duo. As the Honda started probing the defences of the Motorbase Performance Ford Focus, Plato edged away. He eventually took the flag just over two seconds clear, to extend his BTCC wins record to 62.
Shedden finally forged a way by Jackson out of Clearways with three laps to go to give the turbo-engined Civic its first podium.
Jackson narrowly held off Nash to take third, while Paul O'Neill had a quiet run to fifth in his Tech-Speed Chevrolet Cruze.
Eurotech Racing's Andrew Jordan and former champion Matt Neal (Honda) fought their way through the field after poor race one results. They took sixth and seventh, having overcome a struggling Tom Chilton (Arena Ford), who had made a poor start from row two, in the closing stages.
WSR's Rob Collard was top BMW in ninth, after a spirited battle with reigning Renault Clio champion Dave Newsham, who eventually finished 11th in the Geoff Steel BMW.
Top newcomer was again Tony Gilham, who took 10th in his Triple 8 Vectra.
Results - 26 laps: Pos Driver Team/Car Time/Gap 1. Jason Plato Chevrolet 22m21.689s 2. Gordon Shedden Honda + 2.128s 3. Mat Jackson Motorbase Ford + 2.588s 4. James Nash Triple 8 Vauxhall + 3.001s 5. Paul O'Neill Tech-Speed Chevrolet + 4.232s 6. Andrew Jordan Eurotech Vauxhall + 5.859s 7. Matt Neal Honda + 6.286s 8. Tom Chilton Arena Ford + 9.868s 9. Rob Collard WSR BMW + 11.816s 10. Tony Gilham Triple 8 Vauxhall + 16.019s 11. Dave Newsham Geoff Steel BMW + 16.526s 12. Andy Neate Arena Ford + 17.468s 13. Alex MacDowall Chevrolet + 22.893s 14. Nick Foster WSR BMW + 28.476s 15. John George Tech-Speed Chevrolet + 31.259s 16. Jeff Smith Eurotech Vauxhall + 31.395s 17. Chris James ES Chevrolet + 1 lap 18. Liam Griffin Motorbase Ford + 1 lap 19. Tony Hughes Speedworks Toyota + 3 laps Retirements: Tom Onslow-Cole AmD Volkswagen 1 lap Tom Boardman Special Tuning SEAT 0 laps
Be part of the Autosport community
Join the conversationShare Or Save This Story
Subscribe and access Autosport.com with your ad-blocker.
From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.
Top Comments