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British Touring Car Championship
Snetterton (300) - Free Practice - 8/8/15

By MJP Media | 8 August 2015

Andy Priaulx on his birthday and Andrew Jordan top the timing sheets in the free practice sessions at Snetterton as five cars sport new liveries.

Andrew Jordan shines in his new livery MG 888 Racing 6GT
Andrew Jordan shines in his new livery MG 888 Racing 6GT

The Snetterton 300 circuit in Norfolk saw the resumption of the Dunlop MSA British Touring Championship as it started the second half of the 2015 season. Team BMR announced a whole new livery for all four of their cars as they strengthened their relationship with RCIB Insurance. Also sporting a special livery for this weekend only was former champion Andrew Jordan in order to celebrate his new long term sponsorship deal with Pirtek Racing.

In the first of the two outings it was Jason Plato of Team BMR who led for most of the session before birthday boy Andy Priaulx took the fastest lap with only 5 minutes to go with a 1:56.648, 5/100ths of a second quicker. Behind these two were Matt Neal in 3rd, Aron Smith 4th and Jack Goff 5th.

Team BMR show off the new RCIB Insurance livery
Team BMR show off the new RCIB Insurance livery

It was a very close session as just half a second covered the top ten in the dry and warm conditions. There were however a couple of surprises as Sam Tordoff in his JCT600 Racing with GardX BMW 125i M Sport was a lowly 21st, although the team were testing various settings on the car and Rob Austin in the Exocet AlcoSense Audi A4 who was 3rd from last.

The second session was the hottest of the season so far with many cars struggling under braking in the intense heat. The biggest casualty of a lack of braking was Aiden Moffat who lost control of his Laser Tools Racing Chevrolet Cruze coming out of the first corner on a fast lap and having a big impact with the barriers just before the hairpin. The car suffered some structural damage and had a small fire, whilst Aiden was taken to the medical centre for a check up on his wrists and legs.

Andy Priaulx celebrates his birthday in fine style
Andy Priaulx celebrates his birthday in fine style

The times in general were similar to the first session, although Andrew Jordan's leading time was 1/10th of a second faster than Plato's earlier time of this morning. As in the earlier session, the times were once again very close with Andrew Jordan, Colin Turkington and Jason Plato all within 0.04 of a second of each other. Behind them in 4th was Aron Smith, giving the newly liveried team three out of the top four places. Early front-runner Andy Priaulx finished in 5th.

It seems likely that this afternoon's qualifying session will be even hotter as the drivers fight for position on the grid for tomorrow's first race. Qualifying will take place at 3:45 this afternoon and we will bring the details as soon as we have them.

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