It was a case of points points and more points for Wrotham based Airwaves Racing at the latest round of the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship.
The Motorbase-run squad came away from the oval circuit in a strong championship position with a lucrative points haul from all three of Sunday’s races that included four top ten finishes.
Saturday’s sessions proved challenging for the BTCC field with thick fog hampering early runs at the Rockingham Speedway track. A brighter afternoon proved more productive and the Airwaves Racing duo of Mat Jackson and Fabrizio Giovanardi held their own on the highly competitive grid securing P10 and P11 positions respectively.
Sunday’s opening race saw the Focus ST really come to life showing the same blistering pace seen at last month’s Knockhill round. With the Mountune-powered Ford Focus ST on form, double BTCC champion Fabrizio expertly picked his way through the leading cars as the race progressed and the Italian crossed the line in an auspicious P7 – narrowly missing out on 6th behind Jordan’s Honda. Mat Jackson had an equally solid opening race, and like his team-mate needed just one more lap to overcome the Honda in front of him, unfortunately the laps ran out before Mat could make his move and the Focus came home in P9 just under a tenth behind Shedden’s Civic.
Race two proved to be a dramatic affair. With the Airwaves drivers on the pace from the get go; both Mat and Fabrizio slipped passed Jordan and Morgan in the opening two laps to slot into P5 and P6. It was then a side by side Airwaves challenge for position with Mat and Fabrizio entertaining the Rockingham crowds as they tested each other on the oval circuit. After swapping positions, and a little paintwork, the duo then set their sights on catching the lead pack as the laps unfolded. As Mat charged forward whilst fending off a gaining Rob Austin, Fabrizio was embroiled in an epic battle with Collard as the WSR racer tried to muscle his way past the Focus.
Fabrizio’s gritty performance delivered one of the TV highlights of the season so far but the damage sustained saw the Italian fall back into P11 to collect 5 well-earned and hard fought points. Despite looking to be gaining on Menu as the race progressed whilst still gallantly defending his position, the pace of Austin’s RWD Audi proved too much and Mat had to relinquish his spot to cross the line in P7.
Having missed out of the benefit of the reversed grid result, the final race of the day produced a mixed bag of results for the Airwaves squad. With both drivers running on the soft tyre, Mat got off to a superb start, taking both MG’s to move up into fifth as they headed into the first corner. As the race evolved Mat put in a stunning performance closing in on title contenders Turkington and Jordan whilst under attack from Plato’s MG. The Airwaves man delivered a perfect drive completed with a heroic final lap to stave off an attack from Collard; clinging onto his P5 position and securing his third top ten of the weekend. Fabrizio also made good progress during the opening laps, making his way up into eighth and enduring an almighty battle with Sam Tordoff. Unfortunately the results were short lived and the Focus fell back in closing laps, finally settling in P13 as the chequered flag dropped.
The weekend’s results see Mat Jackson maintain his second place position in the Independent Drivers’ Standings with the 33 year-old being the only driver to have scored points in every race so far this season. The Airwaves Racing squad also remains the only team to have its 100% reliability record intact with the #6 Mountune-powered Focus ST’s perfect accomplishment underlining the fantastic consistency of the Motorbase-run squad. The BTCC now has a short three week break before the penultimate round at ‘the home of British Motorsport’ Silverstone on September 27/28.
Reflecting on another excellent weekend, Jackson said: “Obviously P10 in qualifying and then P9, P7 and P5 in the races is a great weekend for us in terms of points. We’ve gone forward in every race and we managed to stay out of trouble and bring the car home with very limited damage so overall I think we’re in a good place. We’ve kept our place to challenge for the championship, fourth in the overall standings and we’ve managed to finish every race again – we’re the only team and driver to have managed that.
“The last couple of laps in race 3 were really close. The tyre degradation was massive and we struggled quite a lot and Collard was obviously very close, but we managed to hold him off and bag a hard fought fifth place. We’re close to the Independents championships but we need to keep bagging these finishes. We need to be consistent and we need to keep bringing the Airwaves car home in the best place we can. Silverstone should be good for us, we have a good record there and the National circuit suits the Focus well.”
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