Rob Austin admits that despite a “tough couple of weeks” after his Brands Hatch crash, his rebuilt Audi A4 feels good after first practice in which he posted the 22nd fastest lap.
“The car feels good – we’ve just got a couple of teething issues,” said Austin to TouringCars.Net “But we’re happy and will have to see how we get on in the next session.”
Austin praised the performance of his team to have the car ready for the weekend, as well as the support of the fans. Following his crash, the team produced and sold a special T-Shirt design proclaiming ‘I helped fix Sherman’, referring to the name Austin gave his car.
“It has been a tough couple of weeks – the boys have worked really ,really hard. We’re fortunate in that the TOCA bits are really strong and stood up to the crash really well – they did what they should. Thankfully I was OK and the boys have changed pretty much changed every panel on the two sides – the boot floor, rear quarters, as well as the boot lid and all of the bolt-on body panels. The team are miracle workers.”
“The T-shirt sales have gone well – we’ve sold about 600 of those. That’s a lot so it’s gone a huge way towards helping pay for the damage. The fans really stepped up and helped us and they’ve done it again here.”
Having claimed this third-ever BTCC podium in the opening race at Brands, Austin is expecting to be able to challenge for podiums at Donington as well.
“I believe the car’s up to it [a podium]. So long as we don’t have any repercussions from the shunt I think we’ll be up there fighting hard. It’s a different circuit and I’m looking forward to it.”