Wrotham based Motorbase Performance through down the gauntlet to the rest of the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car field at the recent tyre test.

Having missed the opening half of the season the team with Mat Jackson and James Cole behind the wheel were back with a bang at Snetterton, topping the time sheets in Norfolk.

David Bartrum’s squad made its intentions clear with the new mountune engine setting the day’s fastest time during the closing minutes with an impressive 0.152 second lead over the pack.

With a busy test schedule planned, the day got underway at 9am with both drivers taking to the 2.97mile circuit.  Mat Jackson and James Cole worked through a raft of set up changes and simulations during the morning session, with Mat concentrating more on outright qualifying pace whilst James focussed on race distance set ups and both Focus ST’s spent the majority of the session near the top of the time sheets.

Further race runs were planned for James following the lunch break with Mat working through additional qualifying simulations before a late change to the set up propelled the #4 Focus ST to top of the screens; marking a dream end to the afternoon’s session and a welcome reward for the Motorbase personnel who have been watching from the side-lines for the first half of the season.

Speaking after an impressive test return, Team Manager Oly Collins said: “It was a really important test for us today. We’ve done some testing but we’ve not been directly up against any other BTCC competitors until today. We knew we had a good car but we really weren’t sure how much everyone else had moved on.

“The work that the team and mountune have done over the winter is paying off and we now head to our first race meeting of the year full of confidence.

The drivers were itching to get back behind the wheel and enjoyed the test session and are looking forward to their racing return at Snetterton in mid-August.

Giving his thoughts after testing, Cole said: “It’s great to be back. We had a structured approach to the day and went through a lot of changes on the car. As is usual in testing, some worked and some didn’t.

“I did some race run simulations which will be valuable when we return here next month and will help both Mat and myself. Mat worked more on the one lap simulation and found a breakthrough towards the end of the day; unfortunately it was too late for me to try but we have the data now and we head to Snetterton in high spirits.”

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