Andrew Jordan and the Pirtek Racing team took a big step towards their maiden British Touring Car Championship drivers’ title with two victories at Rockingham.
“It’s been a fantastic weekend: the first time I’ve scored two wins in one day,” said Jordan. “It was a really important weekend and the team has done a great job.”
Having qualified as the fastest of the Honda drivers’ in fourth despite carrying 36kgs of success ballast on board the #77 Honda Civic, the damp conditions in the opening race played into his hands.
Jordan jumped into the lead of the first race on the opening lap by going around his rivals at the Deene hairpin and never looked back as he brought the car home for his fifth victory of the season. With issues for Championship leader Matt Neal, Jordan moved into the Championship lead.
“I got an awesome start from P4 in the first race, which was wet,” he said. “I just got my head down and pulled away and the car was so good.”
He started the second race with maximum ballast on board the Honda Civic but with the wrong set up on the car, he dropped down the order to finish 8th but had extended his advantage at the head of the Championship.
“The track was drying and we were on slicks,” he said. “But it was still damp and looked like it was going to rain again and we only went about half-way on set-up: we should have gone to a full dry set-up and we struggled as a result,” Andrew said after dropping down to eighth place at the finish. “But Matt Neal was out of the race and so we were then 19 points in front of Gordon Shedden.”
Heading into the final race at Rockingham, Jordan had lost all of the 45kgs of success ballast as he lined up at the head of the field.
Despite having to run the white sidewall tyre in the final race, Jordan was able to pull away from the field to take his sixth victory of the season – in the 2013 season, he has more than doubled his wins tally and has taken the most victories out of anyone on the BTCC field this season.
“I can look after the soft tyres very well and our car was really good on the softs. Sam Tordoff was looking really racey at the start, but I could tell he was using his tyres a lot and it would only be a matter of time before he’d start dropping back,” Jordan explained.
“Then it was a case of keeping it consistent: still pressing on because I didn’t want to break the rhythm and it was only on the last lap that I really backed off.”
The two victories and 8th place mark Jordan’s best weekend to date in the BTCC; a 51 point weekend converting a 6 point gap into a 30 point advantage.
“To go into the weekend six points behind and go out 30 points ahead: it doesn’t get much better than that,” concluded an ecstatic Jordan.