Jason Plato secured pole position in qualifying for the British Touring Car Championship at Oulton Park as teammate Sam Tordoff went second to ensure an all-MG front row of the grid.
Click here for the full Round 10 qualifying results.
Plato set his time with ten minutes gone in the session and only completed four laps in total, such was his dominance over the rest of the field. His time of 1:26.130 was more than seven tenths of a second faster than his pole position lap of last year, and it put him 0.431 ahead of teammate Tordoff.
Gordon Shedden had split the MGs for a long period in the session but had his initial effort scrubbed off for exceeding track limits. He immediately responded to reclaim that second place, but with just over a minute remaining Tordoff usurped him for an MG lock out.
There was a fine performance from Dave Newsham who claimed fourth in his Speedworks Avensis with two minutes to go, but Andrew Jordan qualified outside of the top three for the first time this season as he was unable to replicate his pace from second practice. Frank Wrathall appeared to be in contention for a place on the front two rows of the grid for much of the session but he ultimately had to settle for sixth on the grid.
Matt Neal was unable to match teammate Shedden and lost his car in the Knickerbrook chicane midway through the session on his way to eighth place ahead of Adam Morgan, albeit by virtue of having set his lap of 1:26.831 before the Avensis driver as the pair ended up with identical times.
The field was just as tight as it had been in second practice, with less than a second between Plato in first and Mat Jackson in 11th, and Gordon Shedden’s lap time less than a second faster than Rob Collard’s 1:27.608 which was only good enough for 16th.
Lea Wood arguably saved his best for qualifying as a 1:28.068 put him 19th in his S2000 Vauxhall Vectra, less than two seconds adrift of Plato’s pole position lap and ahead of NGTC drivers James Cole, Nick Foster and Will Bratt. Liam Griffin was once again second in class, with Aaron Mason out-qualifying David Nye and Warren Scott on his BTCC debut.