THE AmDTuning.com team endured a weekend of mixed fortunes at Rockingham after the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship headed to Northamptonshire for the eighth meeting of the year.
Mike Bushell suffered a challenging time on track at the wheel of his Ford Focus, with handling issues limiting him to a single points finished, although there was a more positive outcome for the returning Nicolas Hamilton as the first disabled driver in the history of the championship picked up three more solid finishes to add to his touring car resume.
Having shown strong pace in the damp opening practice session, where his Focus was consistently towards the top of the times, qualifying would prove to be a challenging affair for reigning Clio Cup champion Mike, who was left on the back foot when his car failed the ride height test mid-way through the session.
Stripped of all his times to that point as a result, Mike was then left with just five minutes in which to post a time after a late session stoppage; eventually putting his car 23rd on the grid.
Despite struggling to get the best from the Ford during the opening race, Mike raced hard to fight his way forwards towards the points and he was rewarded with 15th spot – ensuring a points finish for the third meeting in succession.
Unfortunately Mike’s fastest lap was only good enough for 21st on the grid for race two and he was left with work to do on the softer compound Dunlop tyre having slipped back to 25th in the early stages.
Maintaining his pace throughout the race, Mike climbed back up to his starting position by the time the chequered flag dropped.
A strong start when the lights went out in race three saw Mike quickly move up to 16th spot and he looked well placed to challenge for a second points finish of the weekend until an incident on lap seven forced him to retire; contact from the Audi of Hunter Abbott seeing him go off into the gravel exiting Deene.
Having not made the trip to Scotland for the seventh round of the season, the opening practice session of the weekend marked Nicolas’ return to action for the first time in nearly a month.
Despite that, Nicolas was up to speed from the outset and he qualified just two places behind Mike on the grid for race one – marking his best qualifying performance to date in the series.
The opening race of the weekend would see Nicolas run strongly with the pack in arguably his most impressive drive since joining the championship. Fighting for position throughout, Nicolas finished comfortably inside the top 20 – beating a number of his more established rivals on outright pace.
Race two saw Nicolas improve on his fastest time by nearly half a second as he again gained further experience of racing in the pack en-route to 24th spot before another strong run in race three resulted in him taking 17th spot for a second top 20 of the weekend; less than two seconds away from the points scoring positions.
The team now heads to Silverstone for the penultimate meeting of the season at the end of the month.
