SEAT praise 'superhuman' Plato

Plato took part in the races despite suffering burns to his hands, face and neck when the supercar he was testing for a television programme was engulfed in flames last Monday.

He ultimately lost the title to Fabrizio Giovanardi in the last round decider, but Dennis said the team were simply amazed that he had managed to compete given his physical condition.

"When he telephoned on Monday to inform me of his accident, in typical Jason style he said he'd had a slight drama," he said.

"When I saw him the next day, I realised it was significantly more than a slight drama!

"But for him to have done what he has done at Thruxton just goes to prove that not only is he an out-and-out professional, in my book he's the best touring car driver out there.

"We've come to a circuit that we know doesn't suit the Leon, so it would have been hard enough for him to drain every last ounce of power out of the car, but to have done it in the condition that he's been in this weekend is amazing. He's superhuman."

Giovanardi eroded Plato's points lead by winning the first two races of the day, then moved ahead in the standings by finishing second in the final round.

Plato was beaten off the line by his title rival and could only finish fourth after a controversial battle with Vauxhall-bound Matt Neal, who appeared to fight harder with Plato than he had with Vauxhall pair Giovanardi and Tom Chilton.

"We tried our hardest, we did our best and it just wasn't good enough on the day," Plato said.

"It would be easy to look back and pick out situations where we could have done better, but at the end of the day we knew what we had to do in race three here and we didn't do it. We all tried our hardest and it wasn't to be in 2007, so we'll have to come back next year and give it another go.

"It's been a great championship and Fabrizio's a great champion. Somebody has to win and somebody has to lose."