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British Touring Car Championship
Thruxton - Qualifying - 9/5/15

By MJP Media | 9 May 2015

Team BMR continue their good form at Thruxton as Aron Smith secures his first ever BTCC pole position in the qualifying session for the first race tomorrow.

A maiden BTCC pole position for Team BMR's Aron Smith

Following their commanding performance in the free practice sessions earlier today, all eyes were on Team BMR to see if they could continue their success in the qualifying session for the first race tomorrow. Jason Plato and Aron Smith topped the time sheets earlier in the day in their Team BMR Volkswagen CCs, however a puncture induced crash by Plato at the end of the first session meant he could not set a time in the second. After a few test laps, Plato aborted his second session to give his mechanics as much time as possible to fix his car before the start of the qualifying session.

The Team BMR drivers were once again first out on track in their Volkswagen CCs followed closely by the Honda Yuasa Racing Civic Type Rs of Matt Neal and Gordon Shedden and the Power Maxed Racing Chevrolet Cruzes of Josh Cook and Dave Newsham. Any worries about Jason Plato's car were soon laid to rest as the former BTCC champion put in the first meaningful lap time of 1:17.507 before the session was stopped after only 6 minutes following a collision between Simon Belcher and Mike Bushell. Both cars sustained heavy damage as they smashed into the tyre wall so there was a long delay while they were recovered and the barrier re-built.

Adam Morgan briefly held provisional pole position

When the session re-started and the cars were back up to full speed, team-mates Rob Collard and Sam Tordoff went 2nd and 3rd fastest in their JCT600 Racing with GardX BMW 125i M Sports. Within minutes, Matt Neal and Gordon Shedden posted the fastest and 2nd fastest times, pushing Jason Plato down to 3rd. Shedden then went even faster to take the top spot from his team-mate. At the half-way stage Shedden was fastest ahead of Neal with Aron Smith 3rd and Josh Cook 4th before Jack Goff went 3rd fastest in his MG 888 Racing MG 6GT. It was then announced that several drivers were being investigated for exceeding the track limits.

The session continued with little movement at the top of the time sheet until Gordon Shedden went top ahead of Matt Neal as Hunter Abbott caused another red flag situation when his Exocet AlcoSense Racing Audi A4 slid off the track and into the barriers with just under 8 minutes of the session remaining. Shedden then has his lap time disallowed for exceeding the track limits, losing 1st place to Matt Neal. When the session resumed there was a frantic rush to set good times as many of the leading drivers had not achieved their full potential.

Honda Yuasa Racing qualified 2nd and 3rd

With 4 minutes remaining, Dave Newsham put in a brilliant 1:16.969 lap to take 2nd place only to drop to 3rd as Adam Morgan did a fantastic 1:16.802 lap in his WIX Racing Mercedes A-Class to take provisional pole position. Matt Neal then re-took 2nd place before Newsham and Morgan had their lap times disallowed for exceeding the track limits, putting Neal at the top of the time sheet. In the final minutes of the session, Andy Priaulx moved up to 3rd fastest then Adam Morgan re-took 1st place only to lose it to Team BMR's Aron Smith.

At the end of the session it was Aron Smith who secured his maiden BTCC pole position for the first race tomorrow with Gordon Shedden 2nd, Matt Neal 3rd and Adam Morgan 4th. These four were the only drivers to break through the 1 minute 17 second barrier with an average lap speed of over 110mph. Andy Priaulx and Jason Plato completed the top six with Jack Goff, Josh Cook, Colin Turkington and Rob Collard rounding out the top ten.

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