The polystyrene problem behind BTCC qualifying farce

It was a bizarre and disrupted British Touring Car Championship at Croft.

There were five red flag stoppages - with the eventual pole-winner and the joint-championship leader among those to cause the interruptions.

Matt James headed out to the paddock to understand what had happened from the point of view of those involved.

After the crazy Croft qualifying, several drivers questioned the use of Recticel barriers that are being used to stop corner-cutting this weekend.

Two of the five red flags were caused by other issues, but the session was halted three times because cars had left the circuit and connected with the protective objects, which were knocked onto the track and became obstacles.

One of the concerns centred on a barrier on the outside of the circuit at the Jim Clark Esses, and another on the outer part of the track at Sunny Out.

The Esses barrier was dislodged early in the session and it was red flagged. It was halted again when Nic Hamilton's Motorbase Performance Ford Focus connected with a barrier on the outside of the Chicane.

Speedworks Toyota Avensis Toyota Corolla driver Tom Ingram was caught up in the third red flag incident when a block was dislodged by Matt Neal's Team Dynamics Honda Civic Type R at the Esses. The barrier rolled into the track and was collected by Ingram and then Bobby Thompson's Team Hard VW CC.

"It is hard to see what else they can do really," Ingram said afterwards. "Drivers will always be looking to take advantage and they have to put something there. There was more of an issue with the ones that they put on the exit of the corners, because if you go off on the outside, you are generally going to lose time.

"I know this is not utopia where you have 30 world class drivers, but there needs to be some more accuracy from drivers" Jason Plato

"They need to think about the positioning of them. I feel sorry for the bosses at Croft, really, because they have done a great job resurfacing the track and then all people will be talking about is this.

"There is a solution, which they do at MotorSport Vision circuits [Oulton Park, Brands Hatch and Snetterton], and that is pressure sensors on the kerbs. But that is almost prohibitively expensive."

The truncated session meant several drivers were left facing a last-minute scramble to set a representative lap time. Power Maxed Racing Vauxhall Astra racer Jason Plato will line up 10th for race one, but he felt that he had been unable to extract the maximum due to the interrupted session.

"There is a very simple solution to this problem of the Recticel barriers: they need to put proper kerbs on the inside of the corners with a sausage kerb to discourage people from cutting the corners," said the double BTCC champion.

"If there is a proper deterrent and it wasn't faster, people simply wouldn't do it. If they can't do that because of motorbike racers, then they can buy some bolt-in sausage kerbs. That means people wouldn't use the kerbs and you wouldn't even need Recticel barriers in the first place. There needs to be a physical reason not to use that bit of the track.

"But also, look at [reigning champion, WSR BMW driver] Colin Turkington, look at me, look at [Plato's Power Maxed team-mate] Rob Collard - did any of us hit them? No, we didn't.

"There needs to be some precision among the drivers and then this sort of thing would not happen. I know this is not utopia where you have 30 world class drivers, but there needs to be some more accuracy from the drivers out there."

Despite the issues that disrupted the timed session, WSR boss Dick Bennetts said that he thought the dilemma would not continue into race day on Sunday.

"Tyre stacks on the outside of corners is beyond my comprehension in a qualifying session like that. The outside of the track is self-policing, especially as the grass is so wet. It is a needless danger" Rob Austin

"In the race, once they are moved out of the way then [running wide] is impossible to police or stop so it shouldn't be such a problem as all the cars are following another," said the Kiwi. "But I have faith in the BTCC powers that be to come up with any solution that they think is appropriate."

While there were complaints on Saturday, the BTCC officials thought that there would be no alterations for Sunday, although revised instruments are being considered for future races.

Clerk of the course Ian Watson said: "Due to the huge amount of rain there has been, there were some very soft verges around which we needed to protect [the track] in an effort to keep people from running wide and we didn't want them going off the circuit. There were additional Recticel barriers at one or two places because there were dangers beyond."

Watson also said that a new style of barrier was being developed, and it would be trialled at the next rounds of the championship at Oulton Park at the end of June.

"We are looking at what we are doing going forward, but I don't feel there is a need to change anything for race day [at Croft]," he added.

BTCC chief executive Alan Gow was forthright in his condemnation of the drivers who had made contact with the polystyrene barriers.

He said: "The one that caused a couple of problems was the one on the apex of the first element of the Jim Clark Esses - we have put something there for 10 years, so the drivers know about it and they shouldn't find it as a surprise.

"The only reason people are talking about this is because of the number of red flags we had during the session, but not all of them were down to the issue with the Recticel barriers - two of them were for other reasons.

"We don't design the circuits, but using Recticel barriers is what we do and what we have always done."

Expert view

Rob Austin, three-time BTCC race winner and 226-time category starter:

"This is a very difficult issue, because you need do something to stop drivers cutting the corners. They will do that if they can, and if it is wet, they will drag mud on the circuit. Last year at Croft in the dry, it was putting dust in the air and it was causing overheating issues because it was clogging up radiators and ducts.

"The solution isn't simple. Sausage kerbs are a nice idea, but they raise other issues if you spin, you could catch one at funny angle and it could cause a lot of damage. They are unusable for bikes for the same reason.

"The one thing I would say is that tyre stacks on the outside of corners is beyond my comprehension in a qualifying session like that. The outside of the track is self-policing, especially as the grass is so wet. It is a needless danger.

"A couple of years ago, it seemed like the stacks were further back and a Dunlop signage board protruded a little bit. If you got it wrong or misjudged it, you could clip the board and it would slap the car, but it wouldn't break the suspension or throw the tyres into the road.

"Potentially a more deliberate version of this could be a solution going forward."