Shedden’s double delight at Brands

Fifer Gordon Shedden enjoyed his best results of the British Touring Car Championship when he racked up two second places in the latest triple-header at Brands Hatch. And the 30-year-old missed out on his first win by just 0.009secs.

Piloting his Team Honda Civic and in soaking wet conditions, Shedden finished the opening race 5.783s behind the LPG-powered Ford Focus of polesitter and race winner Tom Chilton.

The Englishman then looked to have led a Ford 1-2 ahead of Tom Onslow-Cole in the day’s second race, with Shedden’s Honda third. But minutes after the chequered flag, Chilton was stripped of victory after his car failed a post-race check.

The revised results left Shedden, who finished ninth in the day’s final race, kicking himself for the mistake which, he admitted, ultimately cost him his first win of the season.

“I made a great start to the second race and jumped ahead of Tom,” Shedden explained, “but I made a mistake after a restart following a safety car period. I clipped the grass at Clearways, ran wide and dropped seven places.”I spent the rest of the race battling my way back through the field and to finish, at the time, third, just 0.009s behind Onslow-Cole was bad enough. But then to have the result revised and find I was second was even more frustrating.”

Mat Jackson won the final race for BMW, narrowly edging out the Honda of Shedden’s team-mate Matt Neal by just 0.469s. Double champ Neal is now tied for the lead with Chevrolet’s Jason Plato.

Former champ Plato endured a miserable day finishing eighth in the first race and then failing to finish either of the remaining two races. Shedden heads to the next triple-header at Oulton Park next month sixth, just 17 points off the lead.

JM

Leave a Reply