Sensational race action as Muller closes gap

Mondello Park in Ireland was the scene for rounds 16, 17 and 18 of the 2005 British Touring Car Championship, and it proved to be quite a weekend. After Saturday’s torrential rain, Sunday brought three amazing races that have really spiced up the battle for the championship. It was a great weekend for VX Racing and Yvan Muller, but not quite so good for the men in orange.

RACE ONE

The first race at Mondello Park brought a fourth win of the year for Yvan Muller, as the Frenchman scored a lights-to-flag victory for VX Racing. In second place was SEAT Sport UK’s Jason Plato, while championship leader Matt Neal was third.

Muller mastered the wet conditions at Mondello to take pole position on Saturday and the ice racing star comfortably converted his front row starting spot to the race lead as the field headed through the Honda corner for the first time. He was followed by fellow VX racer, Colin Turkington, with Jason Plato in third. Grid formation was retained, with the exception of James Pickford, whose SEAT Toledo Cupra was knocked off track by Gavin Smith at the exit from the first corner.

Rob Collard in the West Surrey Racing MG ZS was another fast starter, passing Gavin Smith (Vauxhall Astra Sport Hatch) on the first lap and Tom Chilton (Honda Civic Type-R) on the second, moving up to sixth position.

After starting fifth, Matt Neal put his ballast-laden Honda Integra up to fourth when he passed Luke Hines’ SEAT at Turn 7a on the first lap. With Muller pulling away at the front, Jason Plato led the fight for second, just ahead of Turkington and Neal.

As if to illustrate his mastery of the Mondello Park circuit, Yvan Muller set the fastest lap of the race, twice. The 2003 champion clocked identical laptimes on both lap two and three, both times going faster than anyone else managed during the race with a time of 1:47.063.

Colin Turkington successfully acted as rear-gunner for teammate Muller in the early stages of the race, before leaving the door open for Plato to pass into the Dunlop corner. A couple of laps later and Matt Neal also edged out Turkington, but not before the pair ran side by side along the start-finish straight.

After ten laps, Muller led from Plato, Neal, Turkington and Collard. Dan Eaves was sixth in the second Team Halfords Honda Integra, ahead of Gavin Smith, James Kaye, Tom Chilton and impressive 2005 debutant Jason Hughes.

The battle to watch in the closing stages of the race was that between Jason Plato and Matt Neal for second. Plato’s 1.3 second lead was eroded over the course of a single lap, but the Toledo Cupra proved too wide for Neal to find a way past in the time that was remaining, and there were no further changes in the order before the chequered flag.

Muller’s win, along with a point for pole position and one for the fastest lap cut the gap to points leader Neal to 21 points.

Neal said, “We knew Vauxhall would be strong here, but I thought it was going to be worse really. It’s a question of damage limitation really. We’ll have to see what happens in the next race.”

RACE TWO

There was controversy in race two before it even got underway. The Mondello Park circuit had been showered with rain after round 16, and while the rain stopped well ahead of race two, the teams were unsure of just how quickly the track would dry out once the cars started lapping.

BTCC regulations state that when the three minute board is displayed on the grid ahead of a race, no further tyre changes are permitted. In their attempts to get the best possible setup for the race, both Yvan Muller and Jason Plato’s crews failed to complete their tyre selection ahead of this board being shown. The result was a 30-second stop-go penalty for both drivers, as well as for James Kaye, whose Synchro Motorsport team also fell foul of the same regulation.

The penalties were not confirmed until after the race had got underway, and it was Muller who moved into the lead when the lights went out, closely followed by Matt Neal. The still-wet first corner tested the grip of the front-runners, and both Rob Collard and Tom Chilton emerged strongly in third and fourth positions respectively.

Having started on wet tyres, Tom Chilton benefited from high grip levels in the early stages of the race. The Arena Motorsports driver passed both Neal and Muller to lead by the end of the first lap, when Muller also pitted for his penalty. Further changes in the opening laps saw Colin Turkington pass Rob Collard, handing the Ulsterman second position. Jason Plato, who had dropped down through the field, and James Kaye both took their stop-go penalties at the end of the second lap.

At the start of lap three, Chilton was in the lead, with Turkington second and Rob Collard third. The Team Halfords Honda Integras were fourth and fifth, with Dan Eaves ahead of Matt Neal.

With the track starting to dry, Tom Chilton’s wet-shod Civic was losing its edge, and Colin Turkington was able to take the lead of the race with relative ease. Chilton was so sure that wet tyres were not right for the quickly-drying track that he pitted at the end of lap four to switch to slick rubber.

After his penalty, Yvan Muller was quickly up to pace. Despite joining the back of the field, he was lapping between five and seven seconds quicker than the group ahead, which included the two Lexus which were sitting ninth and tenth. Putting in consistently quick laptimes, Muller was making light work of the 30-second deficit that stood in his way. Even a brief spin could not halt his progress, although it did drop him back into the clutches of SEAT’s Jason Plato.

Muller, Plato and James Pickford all closed on the Lexus of Richard Williams and Ian Curley as one. As they passed the green IS200s, it became a three-way fight for ninth and tenth positions – highly valuable given the reverse grid for race three. Muller claimed ninth and Plato edged out his teammate for tenth. As it emerged, VX Racing driver Gavin Smith later retired due to a puncture, promoting Pickford to a top-ten spot as well.

Back at the front, Colin Turkington was looking good for a win in front of his home crowd for the second year in a row, managing to keep Dan Eaves at bay in second. Both cars were running a slicks front/treaded rear combination. As was Eaves’ teammate and championship leader, Matt Neal who was up to fourth position and chasing down Rob Collard in the West Surrey Racing MG. With three laps remaining, Neal’s pressure paid off and he was able to cut inside Collard at Dunlop, depriving the former hot-rod racer of a podium finish once again.

With three laps remaining, Eaves began to close on Turkington at the front, but the Honda’s pace was not enough to deprive the Vauxhall driver of the win in front of his delighted friends and family. Eaves finished second, with Neal third. Collard was fourth and Luke Hines drove a solid race to finish fifth. Yvan Muller continued his rapid progress to climb to sixth position by the end of the race, while Jason Hughes impressed once again in seventh. Tom Chilton, James Pickford and the pole-seeking Plato rounded out the top ten.

RACE THREE

The third race of the day at Mondello Park was quite possibly the most action-packed race that will grace the BTCC this year. It had everything from first lap fracas, to new lap records, to last lap lunges. What is more, the end result dramatically shakes up the championship battle ahead of the remaining races.

The race started with SEAT Sport UK’s Jason Plato on pole position, after he once again worked his way backwards to tenth position in race two to maintain his title as reverse grid master. Unfortunately for Plato, he failed to hang on to the lead past the first corner, when third-place starting Tom Chilton took the inside line and accelerated past the Toledo. A couple of corners later and the Plato-Muller rivalry was renewed once again, with some gentle contact between the pair. Muller, who started fifth on the grid, seized his opportunity when Plato bounced wide off a kerb, stealing the inside line to move through to second, and opening the door for Rob Collard to follow him through in the WSR MG.

Dropping from first to fourth over the course of the opening lap, Plato seemed intent on regaining the position from Collard and there was contact at most of the corners on the following lap, before A nudge from the MG knocked Plato sideways and dropped him a couple of places further down through the pack. Collard then got a hefty hit from Plato’s teammate James Pickford which dropped the WSR driver down to tenth.

Plato began to work his way back through the pack, only for his next dose of contact to halt his progress once again. This time it was the Team Halfords Integras of Matt Neal and Dan Eaves. First up was contact with Eaves, and then at the same corner, Neal and Plato took each other into the gravel trap. Neal rejoined quite quickly, albeit well down the order, but all Plato could manage was to limp back to the pits.

In the meantime, leaders Chilton and Muller opened up a lead of 14 seconds, but this was negated once the safety car was deployed to allow the removal of debris from the track. Muller had managed to find a way past Chilton after the youngster ran slightly wide at the tricky Honda turn. By this time, SEAT’s race was over, as Pickford and Hines had also joined Plato in retirement.

The safety car completed just a single lap, giving every the chance to draw breath before a further four laps of racing. The experienced Muller carefully controlled the restart to give himself a good lead very quickly.

The driver to watch at this stage was undoubtedly Rob Collard. Having run strongly early on, he was now starting to make his way back through the field, clambering all over the back of Colin Turkington before edging out the Astra Sport Hatch to move up to fourth. Having paid just one visit to the podium this year, it looked like Collard was going to miss out once again, but his determination was able to overcome the not inconsiderable damage to his car. He quickly began to chase down Dan Eaves in third, and then somehow, on the final lap, drove around the outside of the Honda at the first corner.

At the end of a quite astonishing race, Yvan Muller claimed his second win of the day, making it a whitewash for the VX Racing team, ahead of Tom Chilton. Collard was an impressive third, with Eaves fourth and Turkington fifth. Championship leader Matt Neal was forced to make a visit to the pits after his contact with Plato, but was able to rejoin and finish seventh and score a handful of points.

But with four meetings to go, Muller’s Irish double cuts Neal’s points lead to just 13 – down from 28 at the start of the weekend. With almost 200 points still up for grabs, the championship fight has clearly been given a boost. Whether the Vauxhall team will continue their run of form will be seen at Snetterton in two weeks time, but if the racing is anything like it was in Ireland, it is guaranteed to be an unmissable spectacle. Watch this space for reactions to the events at Mondello!