Laser Tools Racing’s Aiden Moffat was very pleased with the ‘fantastic race pace’ of his Mercedes-Benz A Class in the opening British Touring Car Championship race at Donington Park.
The two-time BTCC winner started race one in fifth position, posting his time before going off at Goddards with broken front suspension during qualifying.
He progressed in race one, and was elevated to the podium as Motorbase Performance’s Sam Tordoff retired with a gearbox issue while running third.
Moffat told TouringCars.Net that despite suffering with a lack of top end speed, he was very pleased with a positive opening race.
“The pace was great,” said Moffat. “We’re struggling a little bit with straight line speed, but that’s the nature of the Mercedes.
“But on race pace the car is fantastic. We had the frontrunning pace, so it was a very positive race for us.”
Moffat had a disappointing weekend at Brands Hatch for the 2018 season opener, running strongly in race two and three but contact in both races hindered his chances.
“That’s touring cars, isn’t it? You’ve just got to put these things behind you and look forward, which is what we’ve done.
“We just put all the focus to coming back stronger and getting the podium, and we’ve done it. You can’t dwell on the past you just need to keep moving forward.”
Moffat will now carry weight into race two of the day, during which he will run the hard tyre.
“Race two we’re just going to try to salvage whatever we can with the weight and the hard tyre which is the poorer tyre.
“Hopefully we’ll just come back stronger in race three again.”