Ronan Pearson delighted in the new British Touring Car Championship qualifying format at Donington Park, as he secured a career-best qualifying result of fifth for Sunday’s opening race.
The EXCELR8 Motorsport driver was drawn into the first group of cars to take to the Leicestershire circuit in Saturday afternoon’s timed session, with rain starting to fall just as the car’s headed out.
Pearson thus had to contend with tricky conditions, and ultimately only ended up with one run to get his time in, which was good enough to progress to Q2.
With only half of the 12 cars in Q2 able to progress to the final quick six session, Pearson put in a quick lap which was just under eight tenths of a second off the fastest to progress.
The Hyundai driver then repeated his ranking in the final session, upping his pace by two tenths of a second to secure fifth on the grid for the opening race.
“It wasn’t easy – it was quite frenetic at points,” explained Pearson to TouringCars.Net. “Q1 being wet didn’t help, because we were in the first group.
“But we played the right call and the tyre strategy was good. Credit to the team, because they had to pull it off.
“If everyone else had stayed out in front of me and I came in, I couldn’t have cared. It was my call, my gamble. Or not so much so much a gamble, more of an educated decision.
“I’m really, really content with that and then proud of the next couple of sessions because it’s the best I’ve driven the car.”
The 22-year-old was glowing about the format, which saw him get more track time, and which required him to make quick decisions.
“I think it’s a real good spectacle for the fans, and the amount of air time we had was fantastic. You just have to be really on the ball and be decisive, you can’t afford to umm and aah about something.
“It’s about quick thinking. Obviously, the fact that we’ve had the result we’ve had may influence my answer – but yeah, I love it.
Having experienced wet and changeable conditions at Donington Park last year in his début BTCC weekend, Pearson is unfazed by the prospect of a wet race on Sunday.
“It’s a case of get off the line well, slot in. A wet race isn’t always quite as frantic, you don’t see quite as many overtakes unless people make a mistake sometimes.
“But either way I’ve got experience around here in wet and dry, so I’ll take it as it comes.
“We’ve done the hard work now, so whatever unfolds on race day is what it is.”