Gordon Shedden says he is focussed on delivering his strongest results in the second and third British Touring Car Championship races at Donington Park this weekend, once he has got rid of some success ballast.
The Scot will have to carry the maximum 75 kg of ballast in the weekend’s first race as he is the current championship leader. From sixth on the grid, Shedden admits that he doesn’t expect to be able to compete with those immediately in front of him in the opening race, but overall he was pleased with his qualifying effort.
“The car was good, but the red flag probably came at slightly the wrong time,” said Shedden to TouringCars.Net. “Everybody will probably say that, so I’m happy enough – we can go racing from there tomorrow.
“With the weight, you’ve just got to try and make the best of it. I’m starting inside the top ten and I’m happy with that. I can’t race with the people who are at the very front with no ballast, as that’s just not going to happen, but come race two and three there’ll hopefully be a big turnaround in ballast, so we’ll have to see what happens.
“I’ve got to try and look after [the tyres], and try to be nice to them and be somewhere at the end, but it’s a lot of weight to lug around.”
Shedden also believes that the use of the option tyre, which is the harder compound Dunlop rubber this weekend, will prove to be an interesting variable in the races – if it doesn’t rain.
“It will be interesting to see where people have decided to use the hard tyre, as that’s the big anomaly now. I would be surprised if no cars in front of me are using the hard, but you never know, and that will be the next thing that we have to find out about.
“Last year it was the soft tyre around here, so everybody is taking a step into the unknown – it might add something spicy to it in the first race!
“We’ve looked at about six different weather forecasts trying to find the one we like the look of, but it’s the same for everybody. I think at some stage we will get some rain, but how much and exactly when remains to be seen.”