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British Touring Car Championship
Donington Park - Race 1 Report - 20/4/14

By MJP Media | 20 April 2014

Jason Plato takes his first victory of the 2014 Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship in a lights to flag domination of the opening race from Donington Park. Sam Tordoff makes it a 1-2 result for MG.

Jason Plato celebrates his first victory of 2014

Following his impressive performance in the qualifying session yesterday when he smashed the circuit's BTCC qualifying lap record, Jason Plato started the first race of the day in pole position alongside Gordon Shedden. Row two was taken by Plato's team-mate Sam Tordoff and Colin Turkington with Aron Smith and Alain Menu on row three. Reigning BTCC champion Andrew Jordan started in 7th place on row four.

Both the MG KX Clubcard Fuel Save MG6s got a good start to the race with Sam Tordoff rapidly passing Gordon Shedden to take 2nd place. The MG team-mates then extended a commanding gap with Jason Plato leading Tordoff. Gordon Shedden held on to 3rd place for several laps before his Honda Yuasa Racing Civic Tourer was passed by the eBay Motors BMW 125i M Sport of Colin Turkington on lap 6.

Jason Plato and Sam Tordoff dominated the race

Colin Turkington's grasp on 3rd place was short-lived, as two laps later he was passed by the Pirtek Racing Honda Civic of Andrew Jordan and the eBay Motors BMW of Rob Collard, pushing Gordon Shedden down to 6th place. Behind the leaders, Fabrizio Giovanardi had made his way up from 11th on the grid to be running in 7th place in his Airwaves Racing Ford Focus ST.

Elsewhere in the field, Aron Smith had maintained his 5th place start in the Chrome Edition Restart Racing Volkswagen CC before running wide on lap 3 and dropping to 8th behind Andrew Jordan, Matt Neal and Rob Collard. Glynn Geddie, who got a good start to the race, made up places on each of the first five laps to be running in 13th place on lap 5.

Andrew Jordan takes Colin Turkington for 3rd place

As the race settled down, the front runners held their positions. Jason Plato was being pushed hard by team-mate Sam Tordoff however the former BTCC champion managed to stay ahead and record his first victory for the 2014 season with Tordoff a strong 2nd. Andrew Jordan completed the podium places with a 3rd place finish ahead of eBay Motors drivers Rob Collard and Colin Turkington in 4th and 5th. Gordon Shedden completed the top 6.

Andrew Jordan has now extended his lead in the championship, however Colin Turkington is just 4 points behind in 2nd place with Rob Collard only 1 point further behind in 3rd. Race two will start with the MG6s of Jason Plato and Sam Tordoff on the front row of the grid. Plato will be carrying the maximum amount of success ballast which may give Tordoff the advantage he needs to turn the tables on his team-mate.

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