Halfords Yuasa Racing’s Dan Cammish has described his British Touring Car Championship weekend at the Brands Hatch Grand Prix circuit as “bitterly disappointing.”
The 2019 runner-up qualified on the front row of the grid for race one behind polesitter Rory Butcher and applied pressure to the Motorbase-run Ford Focus ST before it would suffer a left-front puncture on the penultimate lap of the opening contest.
That left Cammish to inherit the victory to get his day off to a perfect start and provide redemption for the events of the season finale at the same circuit at the end of 2019.
In the following race, Cammish bogged down at the start, slipping to fourth before regaining third from Ollie Jackson and running comfortably in the podium spot until until a faulty powersteering fuse plummeted him down the order.
“Obviously bitterly disappointing for myself and for the team,” he told ITV after race two.
“We had a good race up until that point, we made a bit of a mistake at the start, that was me trying to maximise the start against Colin [Turkington].
“I knew I was always going to be second into turn one against Colin, that BMW just starts so much quicker than we do.
“I just fluffed it, not enough revs, bogged the engine and was lucky not to stall it really. Recovered to fourth, but that was completely on me.
“I was trying to be a bit too clever with it really, should have given it a bit more than that. Then we settled in, and we had a fast car even with 60 kilos in, the car felt really good.
“Got back up to third, went a little bit with the guys in front but again we had such a gap to fourth I just thought realistically where do I go from here, get involved in this or do I just sit and see what comes?
“The next thing you know I’m parked at the side of the road, so it was a big shame. In a nutshell the powersteering fuse popped out, so not a failure as such. I did get the car going again at one point, but it was just a shame.”
Hoping to emulate the recovery drive of Butcher from the back of the grid to fourth in race two, Cammish made solid progress in his ballast-free Honda Civic Type R and was up to 12th position behind title rival Turkington by the halfway mark.
Cruel luck would strike his Honda again as he ground to a halt on the run down Pilgrim’s Drop approaching Hawthorns Bend, seemingly with an overheating issue on his car.
“It’s frustrating when you’ve given everything on such a hot day. You’re racking up some great points in a very tough championship and unfortunately you’ve kind of thrown it away,” he said.
“These things happen, obviously it’s disappointing especially here 10 months on or so from what happened last year.”
The consecutive non-score dropped Cammish to fifth from second in the championship standings, but means he will carry only 36kg of success ballast into Oulton Park as opposed to the 54kg he took into this weekend.
Cammish took to Twitter to summarise his feelings after race three, noting the bittersweet memories he has of the 2.4-mile GP circuit at which he has now won four times.
“My god Brands Hatch GP. You have given me some fantastic highs and terrible lows over the years,” he reflected.
“A win and a double DNF is not the weekend we wanted. The attrition rate has been high in the heat but we’ll be lighter now and determined to fight back.”