Turkington closes in on BTCC title with two wins at Rockingham

Colin Turkington has increased his lead in the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship following an exciting day of racing at Rockingham.

The WSR BMW driver quickly passed Sam Tordoff in pole position at the start of race one, and despite an early safety car period - caused by the spinning Toyota of Lea Wood - kept the lead until the end of the race. 

Turkington pushed his BMW M135i hard around the Rockingham circuit to break defending champion Andrew Jordan’s lap record with a new time of 1m23.508s

Coming in second and third place respectively were the MG6-driving duo of Sam Tordoff and Jason Plato.

It was Swiss driver Alain Menu who won the crowd’s affection in race one, however, after mounting an aggressive charge through the field which saw him move from 10th to 4th place.

Turkington’s dominance was proven once again in race two, when the 32-year-old again lead from start to finish, though the main action took place further down the field.

The Honda Civic Tourer of Gordon Shedden was sent onto the grass on the opening lap, dropping him into 12th place, while Andrew Jordan was put under pressure from the rest of the pack, placing him 10th in the opening stages of the race. The Honda Civic driver recovered, however, eventually finishing in 4th place.

Jordan was unable to pass Plato and Tordoff at the front of the field, as the MG duo took their second double podium of the day.

Come the reversed grid of race three, and it was Menu who sat on the top spot with the Audi A4 of Rob Austin in second. 

Austin passed Menu’s Volkswagen CC quickly after the start, while Jordan, Turkington, Plato and Mat Jackson kept the action interesting in the middle of the field.

It was another poor race for 2012 champion Shedden, who was caught up in the traffic of the opening laps, with contact damage and a resulting puncture putting an end to his race early.

Austin powered to an easy finish, taking the final flag of the day with Menu in second and Jordan in third. 

The results of todays racing mean that Turkington has a 55-point advantage over Jason Plato, with 366 and 311 points respectively, while Shedden sits in third place with 302 points.

Plato is now the only driver in with a shot of catching up with Turkington over the six remaining rounds of racing.

The penultimate round of the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship takes place at Silverstone on 27-28 September.

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