Just 0.115 seconds separated Jason Plato and Darren Turner, as the SEAT Sport UK duo qualified in 5th and 6th positions for tomorrow’s first of three Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship races at Thruxton.

Darren, carrying 36kgs of success ballast on his Leon which he inherited from James Thompson (who qualified in second position today at the FIA World Touring Car Championship race at Oschersleben), made a fantastic BTCC qualifying debut by lapping the high-speed 2.356 mile Hampshire circuit in a time of 1:18.262. With just two 40 minute free practice sessions before qualifying, this was a magnificent achievement by the 32-year old driver from Banbury.

Jason, third in the BTCC Drivers’ standings and therefore carrying 27kgs of ballast, attacked the kerbs with precision driving. But having squeezed every possible fraction of a second out of his Leon, Jason’s best time was 1:18.147 – 0.314 seconds slower than pole-sitter Gordon Shedden.

With the top-end straight line speed of the Leon preventing either driver breaking the 1:18 second barrier, Jason and Darren ended their qualifying session early.

Jason said: “The car’s fantastic, the chassis’s brilliant, but the aerodynamics is the problem and we’re not very good down the straights. At the end of the longest straights we’re nine kilometres and hour down on the others, and that’s purely because of the shape of the car. To have qualified fifth, three-tenths off pole, I’m quite pleased, but I think tomorrow in the races we’re going to struggle like hell. We’re going to have good pace, but we’re not going to be able to overtake anyone because we’re going to lose four cars lengths down the straight. It’s going to be hard tomorrow. Very hard.”

Darren said: “We made a few chances during the qualifying session, mainly putting more rear wing on the car to dial out the oversteer around the back of the circuit, and it improved things. I’m not able to do anything better than a 1:18.2 and to get on the front row we needed about three tenths more than that. I’m a little bit disappointed with being P6, but quite happy that I’m relatively close to Jason. We’re going to look through the data tonight, see if I can improve my driving and keep on learning. It’s never easy and it certainly won’t be easy tomorrow, but I’m here to try and score as many manufacturer points for SEAT as I can and that’s what I’ll be trying to do.”

Rounds 10, 11 and 12 of the BTCC take place on Sunday 4th June, with the three 16 lap races starting at 11.00, 13.15 and 16.50.