WIX Racing’s Adam Morgan admits that Brands Hatch proved to be a solid start to the 2014 British Touring Car Championship, with the Mercedes-Benz driver securing three points finishes.
Morgan finished the first race of the day in 13th, having suffered from a slow puncture towards the end of the race. He moved back up the grid in race two to finish in eighth, before securing a second top ten result in tenth in the final race of the day.
“It’s been a good weekend for us, and to get three points finishes and be seventh in the championship with a brand new car is good going,” admitted Morgan. “We had work to do after qualifying, so to score in the first race was a solid start, especially as the slow puncture in the final laps meant it was a bit lairy going through Paddock Hill Bend!
“The team made some big changes to the car for race two to try and improve things and they did a great job; it was transformed. I got a mega start and jumped up the field, and then I was able to stay with the BMWs after the restart. I was quicker than them through part of the lap but they had an advantage on the straights, as straight-line speed is the one thing we’ve lacked.”
“I got an excellent start in the final race and the car felt really good. I was keeping pace with the Hondas ahead but after the Safety Car period, the tyres just dropped off the cliff. I tried to hold the guys behind as well as I could, and just made sure I stayed out of trouble.”
Morgan added that the team had been able to gather valuable data about their new Mercedes-Benz A-Class which made its BTCC début at the weekend.
“We’ve got a lot of data from this weekend and now have experience of running the soft tyre, so we can head back to base and work on improvements in time for Donington Park.”
WIX Racing Chief Engineer Paul Ridgeway was pleased to see the team score three solid points finishes without technical problems on car’s début in the series.
“There aren’t many teams that will roll out a new car and run without any real problems and score three points finishes in a series like this,” said Ridgeway. “It’s probably gone better than we expected, although it’s a shame that we didn’t quite find the sweet spot in qualifying, as we could have been a bit higher on the grid. With it being so tight on the times, an extra tenth of a second could have made a huge difference.
“We know where we need to improve and we’ll look through the data we’ve collected and then we can aim to make more progress when we get to Donington in a few weeks time.”
Adam Morgan weekend results
| POS | NO | CL | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME/GAP | BEST | GD |
| 13 | 33 | I | Adam MORGAN |  |
WIX Racing | Mercedes-Benz A-Class | 24 | 19.412 | 49.352 | 14 |
| POS | NO | CL | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME/GAP | BEST | GD |
| 7 | 33 | I | Adam MORGAN | |
WIX Racing | Mercedes-Benz A-Class | 27 | 3.524 | 49.337 | 13 |
| POS | NO | CL | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME/GAP | BEST | GD |
| 10 | 33 | I | Adam MORGAN | |
WIX Racing | Mercedes-Benz A-Class | 27 | 8.728 | 49.246 | 7 |