Both Jason Plato and Darren Turner broke the 1:24.908 qualifying lap record at Rockingham today, but it still wasn’t quite good enough for a HiQ MSA British Touring Car Championship front row starting position tomorrow. At the end of a frantic 30 minute session, in which track conditions changed from soaking wet to completely dry, Darren will celebrate his 34th birthday by starting from 4th on the grid, while Jason will mark his 250th BTCC race from 5th.

Just at Brands Hatch two weeks ago, a torrential shower of rain 30 minutes before qualifying drenched the track, but as the session began the sun came out and conditions dried rapidly. Having started with grooved wet tyres all ‘round, Jason was one of the first drivers to change onto slick front Dunlop tyres and set a provisional pole time of 1:28.820. The car was working just as he liked it, but as the track dried too much for wets to be used on the rear, the Leon TDI wasn’t so comfortable with slick tyres all ‘round in the cold conditions. Despite getting delayed in slower traffic, Jason got his time down to an eventual 1:24.760 best, but at the end of qualifying it was good enough for 5th, 0.433 seconds behind pole-sitter Gordon Shedden.

It was a similar story for Darren who, mid-way through the session, held pole with a time of 1:26.363. He’d slipped down the order towards the end of qualifying and with all the BTCC cars out on the 1.94 mile International Super Sports Car Circuit he was under pressure to put in a great lap. He’d worked himself up to 7th with a 1:24.817 and then on his final lap did a 1:24.662 – getting ahead of his team-mate and putting himself on the second row of the grid by just 0.098 seconds.

In a tactically difficult qualifying session, the two drivers currently ahead of Jason in the BTCC Drivers’ standings, series leader Fabrizio Giovanardi (Vauxhall Vectra) and Mat Jackson (BMW 320si), qualifying in 10th and 9th places respectively. The weather forecast for race day tomorrow is for more showers, sunny intervals and a high of just 10°C.

Jason Plato said: “It’s a shame it didn’t stay wet in qualifying, because the Leon TDI was working really well and I think we could have got pole. Twice when the conditions have been tricky we have been right up there, yet for the second qualifying session in a row we’ve just been in the wrong place at the wrong time when conditions improved. This time I didn’t get a clean lap in on slicks, and traffic stopped us qualifying on the front row. We’ve got some set-up options to look at overnight and if we can find a good balance we could have a good race day.”

Darren Turner: “Qualifying was very frustrating, because we did a good time but it could have been better. It was similar to Brands Hatch in terms of the conditions changing and we held pole briefly. But towards the end of the session we found ourselves on the back foot and we had to put in a good time on a very busy track. Fourth isn’t a bad place to qualify, but I feel we should have been battling for pole.”