Mat Jackson has scored a sensational first win of his and Motorbases season in race one at Rockingham after taking Motorbases first pole yesterday.
Mat got a great start off the line and immediately pulled out a lead he was never to lose. But behind things were much closer, a bit too close! Jason Plato had made an average start by his standards and found himself just ahead of Tom Ingram. Ingram had Josh Cook’s Power Maxed Chevrolet behind him and Cook misjudged his braking running into Ingram who then ran into Plato.
Plato had to pit for repairs and dropped to three laps down, considering the dame that was an impressive feat by the BMR team. For the rest of the race, Plato concentrated on trying to set a fast lap to get a good grid position for race two. Twelfth was the best he could manage but it was something salvaged from what had become a disaster of a first race.
“It wasn’t part of the plan but what can you do,” said Plato afterwards. “It was a crucial to get back out there and the team did a brilliant job. Now we’ve realistically got to target a race three win.”
Shedden made a great job of salvaging what could have been a difficult race after he received a post qualifying penalty on Saturday for leaving the pits out of garage order. He got a great start in his Honda Civic to run third at the end of the first lap and by the fourth he had passed Aron Smith for second which he then held to the flag, even closing on leader Jackson a little when he slowed as the race entered the later stages.
“What a fantastic race,” said Shedden in a post race interview. “There was loads of overtaking and this was the best possible result for me.”
After losing second to Shedden, Smith then had MG’s Jack Goff and Honda’s Matt Neal pressuring him for his podium position. He wasn’t going to lose out a second time and held on to take third ahead of Goff.
Matt Neal suffered a puncture on the final lap, dropping him from fifth to eighth, as Ingram, Jordan and Turkington all passed the ailing Honda.
Ingram himself had made a bad start from his fourth place on the grid which was then made worse by the collision with Cook and Plato so fifth was a great recovery. Jordan had a quiet race but managed to fight his way to sixth by the flag. Turkington had an even quieter race as he took seventh.
Adam Morgan took the second fastest lap of the race and he nearly caught the slowing Neal for Eighth. He’ll start on the front row for race two alongside Shedden who took the fastest lap of the race and so the race two pole.
In other incidents, Palmer and Lines collided sending Lines’ Houseman Racing Toyota flying into the gravel and out of the race. Kieran Gallagher was another Toyota Avensis in the wars as contact with Alex Martin saw him make heavy contact with the barriers. His team would have a race against time to get him out again.
The two Mercedes of Aiden Moffat and Adam Morgan were having a great battle with each other until Moffat spun into the gravel and out of the race. Morgan kept going until he collided with Warren Scott. The impact broke the VW CC of Scott and he headed to the pits and it put Morgan down in ninth.
Tenth was Sam Tordoff another driver having a quiet race with Cole in eleventh ten places behind his Motorbase team mate. The final points positions were taken by Newsham, Cook, Depper and Mike Bushell.
It became clear after the race that Mat Jackson was especially lucky as he had suffered a puncture on the final lap which was what had caused him to slow. Fortunately he hung on to take a great win. He was very happy afterwards;
“To get pole position was great but to top it off with a win is amazing,” said Jackson. “We only just made it after a front-right puncture, but the team has given me a great car and it’s a fantastic result.”
Full results are on TSL timing By Marc Waller
