Andrew Jordan made a much needed return to the top of the time sheets in the first practice session at Thruxton as he flew round the Hampshire circuit in his Pirtek backed Motorbase Ford Focus.
After a couple of disappointing weekends so far in 2016, Jordan is ballast free and has always gone well at Thruxton in the past so this should be the perfect venue for him to take his first win of the season.
He moved to the top of the timing screens early on in the session and then was never headed during the session with a time of 1:16.814 being his best, set on lap nine.
Just behind him was MG’s Josh Cook who was just 0.024 seconds off the quickest time.
Some front runners suffered issues with Sam Tordoff pulling out with a fuel pressure issue and Colin Turkington stopping at the final chicane although before he stopped he had set third fastest time.
Adam Morgan had the worst time of all with a high speed off in his Wix Racing Mercedes at the first corner damaging the front end of his car and bringing out the red flags with less than ten minutes to go. Despite this, he still ended up tenth fastest.
Mat Jackson was fourth in the sister Ford Focus to Andrew Jordan’s, with Jackson’s pace perhaps even more impressive as he is running with ballast.
Team JCT600 with GardX’s Rob Collard was fifth at his local circuit with the Hampshire based driver living less than half an hour from the circuit.
Tom Ingram was sixth despite suffering a puncture as the team tried to perfect the best setup for this tricky circuit.
Jack Goff and Sam Tordoff put the other two WSR run BMW’s in the top eight ahead of Jeff Smith who was the top Eurotech Honda, beating new team mate Daniel Lloyd. The Young driver is still adapting to the Honda and will only get quicker as the weekend progresses. He took fifteenth in this session.
Matt Neal and Gordon Shedden were eleventh and twelfth, possibly struggling for pace due to their success ballast.
Completing the top fifteen in front of Daniel Lloyd was Ashley Sutton of MG and Hunter Abbott of Power Maxed Racing.
Jason Plato again struggled in his Subaru in only twenty first.
Full times are on the championship’s timing partner, TSL’s website; By Marc Waller
