Despite taking a dominant lights-to-flag victory in the first British Touring Car Championship race of the weekend at Oulton Park, double champion Colin Turkington admits he is expecting a much more difficult challenge in the second contest this afternoon.
Turkington romped home over two seconds clear of BMW’s Sam Tordoff to clock the first ever victory for a Subaru model in the series, with team-mate Jason Plato completing a strong race for Silverline Subaru BMR Racing after claiming third.
After a trademark strong start in the rear-wheel drive Levorg, Turkington eased clear of the rest of the field and managed the gap to Tordoff behind, ensuring he will start race two with the full quota of 75kgs of success ballast on board, the equivalent of a second Turkington sitting in the cockpit.
Reflecting first on taking the first Subaru win in the championship, Turkington expressed his delight and paid tribute to the hard work of the engineering staff at BMR, dedicating his win to their efforts.
“I’m delighted for the team,” enthused Turkington. “This result is good for me, but it’s even better for all the guys who have put in so much hard work and until now got nothing back.”
He also pointed towards the continued improvement of the Levorg GT and believes that the package as a whole is moving in the right direction as he and the team look to continue it’s development with a championship charge in mind for next season.
“The performance of the car has really progressed since the first three weekends; we’ve found the Levorg’s sweet spot and the whole package is really moving forward.”
Looking ahead to the second contest, which starts at 14:45, Turkington admitted that putting weight into the car throws up an unknown for the team having run the season so far ballast-free as a result of their performances.
He expects to face a sterner challenge from his closest rivals as a result, with Tordoff starting alongside him on the front row and with both Plato and defending champion Gordon Shedden behind on row two.
“We know there’s still more work to do and race two will be a bit of a step into the unknown as we’ve never carried any weight before, so I’m not so sure the next one will be quite as easy…”