As the touring car paddock counted down to the season finale at Brands Hatch, news emerged that Airwaves would be ending their 6-year strong, title sponsorship with local BTCC team, Motorbase.

The Airwaves sponsored machines had become one of the modern day iconic liveries in the series, plastered on the teams BMW, and Ford racers over the last half decade, and with this partnership ending, the team had their sights set on finishing on a high together.

With a mixed weather forecast looming over the Brands GP circuit for the weekend, the team made the most of changing track conditions with the highest of their drivers, Matt Jackson posting times to put him in the top 10 for both practice sessions on Saturday.

Qualifying was a similar story – a short rain shower just before the cars took to the track, set up an exciting qualifying. Throughout the session the track dried with each lap turned, so it became a case of who set their fastest lap, last, would get the pole position.

As times tumbled, the Motorbase Fords kept on pace with all 3 finishing in the top 20, with Jack Clarke 20^th,  Matt Jackson 8^th and Fabrizio Giovanardi up in 6^th.

With Sunday morning upon them, race 1 started on an almost completely dry race track so teams had to second guess on race setups since they had yet to have any race-distance running on a dry surface.

As the lights went out, the field streamed in to turn 1, but the Honda of Gordon Shedden made contact with Giovanardi as they ran side by side, which sent the Honda spinning in front of the pack.

Fortunately, Giovanardi survived the contact and avoided the spinning Shedden, where as the second Airwaves Ford of Matt Jackson was able to clear the incident, making up a number of places. Through a couple of safety car periods and restarts, the pair got stuck in to the action up front eventually finishing race 1,7^th for Giovanardi, and an impressive 4^th for Jackson.

With the finishing results from the first race setting the grid for race 2, Motorbase had high hopes for a podium finish. As the field launched from the Grid, the team had all the more reason to cheer, as Jackson perfected his start, propelling him between both of the MG’s.

As the race settled in to a quick safety car period, Jackson had found himself up in 3^rd position from the initial jostling from the start. When the race restarted, the lead pair of Jason Plato and Colin Turkington clashed at turn 1, which allowed Jackson to sweep past in to the lead, but the lap in which he claimed the lead, he lost it.

Further round the lap he ran wide on to the still damp grass sending him spinning off track. After light contact with the wall he managed to continue but virtually last on the road. To add insult to injury, team mate Giovanadi spun out of a top 5 position just minutes later.

Both managed to continue but much further down the order, leaving them with only a handful of laps tosalvage decent results. But during the misfortune of the Airwaves Fords, Jack Clarke in the Crabbies sponsored, Motorbase machine had managed to battle his way up in to the top 15, and was fighting for a top 10 position which of course would of given him a chance of a reverse grid race 3, pole position.

Clarke finished race 2 in 11^th on track but after the exclusion of Jason Plato, this elevated Jack to 10^th which conveniently became the position the grid would be reversed from, handing him pole for race 3. Meanwhile, Matt Jackson had recovered to 12^th by the end of race 2 (Became 11^th due to Platos exclusion).

With the cars on the grid for race 3, the heavens opened and the rain began to fall meaning Jack Clarke had to set off from his first pole position in changeable conditions.

Faced with a wet track and the pressure of his first BTCC pole position, Clarke made a great get away, only being beaten to turn 1 by the fast starting, rear wheel drive BMW of Nick Foster.

Again, the first few laps of this race were plagued with short safety car periods due to a number of small off’s, but once the racing got underway, the pace of Fosters BMW faded on the now soaked track, which allowed Clarke to re-pass in the far more suited Ford Focus. Gordon Shedden was quick to claim the lead from Clarke, but Clarke managed keep the leads pace holding on to finish in 2^nd.By far his best result to date.

As Clarke thought for his podium place, Matt Jackson made the most of the conditions and had clawed his way in to an impressive 3^rd position, considering he had fallen to the back of the pack mid way through race 2.

It was a day of ups and downs for the Motorbase team, but finishing with a double podium was the perfect way to sign off their season campaign and their long term sponsorship with Airwaves.