Power Maxed Racing’s Michael Crees had his best-ever weekend in the British Touring Car Championship at Thruxton, picking up three top ten finishes in Sunday’s races.
Prior to the eighth meeting of the season, Crees had already scored his best finish of the season on the first visit to the Hampshire circuit back in May.
The Vauxhall driver steadily improved on Saturday, from 23rd in first practice through 14th in second practice to finally securing his best-ever qualifying result with seventh in the all-important afternoon session, seven tenths from pole.
Crees then ran as high as sixth early on in race one, before ultimately falling back to eighth by the chequered flag, to equal his season-best result.
He slipped back to tenth at the start of race two, then 11th a few laps later, but fought back to finish in ninth, which ended up giving him a third-place starting position for the partially-reversed grid final race.
Unfortunately for the Broadstairs racer, a poor start saw him immediately fall to fifth, before he was shuffled to seventh by the exit of the Complex and ninth by the end of the lap,
However, he fought back, having a close battle with the Hyundai of Tom Ingram late in the race to take the finish in eighth.
“It’s been a solid weekend,” said Crees. “Obviously the best weekend I’ve had in touring cars with three top ten finishes, a best result of eighth again and three second places in the Independents which is good.
“I’m gutted I didn’t convert the last race into my first podium – we had a great chance starting third and our pace was really strong – definitely good enough to run in the top three.
“We bled the clutch before I went out, did the normal procedure but it just didn’t get off the line. I did well to hold my own there, found my pace and raced well which was good.
“The car has been a lot better this weekend. We had to dial through some problems on Friday and Saturday but we’ve had an all-round good weekend.
“Roll on Silverstone, hopefully we’ll be looking as good there!”
Crees stays 20th in the drivers’ championship standings but is now just four points behind team-mate Ash Hand overall.