Team Honda’s Gordon Shedden has taken his third win of the season in race three at Snetterton, leading Rob Collard and Matt Neal accross the line. It had looked like being a Honda 1-2 until the final lap, when Collard muscled his way past Neal.
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The win keeps alive Shedden’s championship challenge and means he is still within 25 points of leader Jason Plato. The Scotsman started third but took second on the opening lap of the race after team-mate Neal got off to a poor start. This then became the lead after pole sitter and early leader James Nash went off on the second lap at Riches. As he turned into the high-speed bend, the back of his Vauxhall Vectra lost grip and the 24-year-old was pitched into a huge fishtail moment that eventually threw him into a cabbage field where his car became grounded.
Finishing in second was Rob Collard, who spent much of the race glued to the back of Matt Neal’s Honda Civic. Despite getting the jump on Neal at the start, Collard lost out at the end of the first lap when he was passed into the chicane, with Collard forced to cut the corner to avoid an accident. Despite rejoining the circuit in front he had to cede the position and then spent most of the rest of the race on the back of the Honda Civic.
Neal, complaining that he had lost vision in his left wing mirror, was forced to defend heavily from Collard and on the final lap the WSR driver tapped the back of Neal’s car going into the esses, forcing him wide and taking second. Collard would later be penalised with 3 points on his racing licence for the move, but was able to keep the position.
Tom Chilton, who finished fourth, made up a handful of positions in the opening laps of the race before settling down as he struggled to match the pace of the leading trio. He came under sustained pressure from fifth-placed finisher Jason Plato, but held on to his position by being able to pull ahead along the long straights.
Just behind Plato in sixth was Steven Kane, despite pressuring the Chevrolet driver hard in the final few laps. His team-mate Mat Jackson was 7 seconds further behind in seventh. Jackson had been running in fourth on the second lap but as he defended against Tom Onslow-Cole into the esses the two cars made contact and Jackson lost several positions, whilst Onslow-Cole spun down to last place. With damage to one of his doors, Onslow-Cole was later forced to pit and a change of tyres late in the race at least meant he was able to salvage a point for fastest lap despite finishing in 16th and last.
Paul O’Neill had a brilliant and battling race to finish in eighth, putting some overtaking moves on Tom Boardman and David Pinkney at Sear corner in the process. His team had been working frantically to repair his and team-mate John George’s cars after their second race accident, so for both cars to be out in race three was very impressive.
David Pinkney finished in ninth, his 6th points finish of the year, after benefitting when O’Neill passed Andy Neate into the esses on the penultimate lap. Neate himself took the final point for tenth, in what was only his third points finish of 2010.
Tom Boardman’s Special Tuning UK team put in another great effort to fix his car for race three, and he just missed out on a points finish in 11th. John George, also in a repaired car, followed behind in 12th.
Alex MacDowall struggled to make significant progress in the race after starting from 17th and he crossed the finish line in a relatively lowly 13th.
Lea Wood failed to finish the race after an off at Sear on lap 14, whilst Andrew Jordan failed to make the race start due to problems with his NGTC engine which overheated and expired on the installation lap.