Mat Jackson took victory in the reverse grid third race at Croft after sustaining constant pressure from both West Surrey Racing BMW’s of Nick Foster and Rob Collard, who took second and third respectively. It was a convincing drive from Jackson, who had earlier narrowly missed out on victory, and marks his first-ever win at Croft.
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Although polesitter Nick Foster got off to a good start in his rear-wheel drive BMW, he was later passed half-way around the first lap by Jackson, who had also made a strong start from third on the grid. Although the Ford driver had to sustain pressure from both Foster and, later in the race, Collard he held on to take his 15th career win in the BTCC.
Nick Foster took his first-ever podium in the BTCC when team-mate Collard let him past on the final run to the finish line. Foster had four laps previously let Collard through to see if he could challenge for the win but when Collard was unable to pass Jackson he let Foster enjoy the second-place he deserved.
Andrew Jordan finished in fourth, having passed Gordon Shedden on lap 11. Fifth was James Nash who also passed Shedden on the penultimate lap.
Sixth and seventh were the two works Honda cars of Shedden and team-mate Matt Neal, who struggled to make progress having started from seventh and carrying 45kg of ballast.
After failing to finish the second race, Alex MacDowall faced an uphill task to finish strongly in race three. However he fought his way up to eighth position by the end of the race, after having started down in 16th.
Tom Chilton had a difficult race after having started in second. The Team Aon driver lost out to Jackson at the race start and then lost positions to both Collard and Shedden further around the opening lap when he went wide at ‘Sunny In’. Having been sixth at the end of the first lap, he slipped to ninth by the end of the race.
Dave Newsham took the final point for tenth position.
Jason Plato started the race from 20th after his car’s CV join failed in race two. The Chevrolet driver had a difficult race and struggled to make rapid progress through the field, eventually finishing in 11th place and missing out on the points after being held up by slower cars in front.
Failing to finish the race was Frank Wrathall, who slid into the same section of field that Liam Griffin did in race two. The off was caused by damage to the Lancashire racer’s Toyota after he clipped a stack of tyres at the previous corner. Rob Austin also failed to finish and pulled off after five laps. Both NGTC drivers experienced a mixed weekend – after the promising speed both drivers displayed on Saturday and Sunday neither took home any points.