Race two report

Sun 2nd August 2009 Fabrizio Giovanardi took a second consecutive win in round 17 of the 2009 HiQ MSA British Touring Car Championship at Snetterton this afternoon. The VX Racing driver led away from pole position and enjoyed one of the more straightforward wins of his career.

Giovanardi and Mat Jackson started from the front row and that was the order through Riches. Jonny Adam was third after leapfrogging Paul O’Neill off the line. O’Neill lost out to another BMW before the end of the opening lap, after Colin Turkington passed him for fourth going into the Esses. Turkington’s Team RAC teammate Stephen Jelley was less fortunate at the same part of the track, coming together with Adam Jones’ Cartridge World SEAT Leon. Both drivers dropped down the order as a result.

Lap three saw Matt Neal’s weekend go from bad to worse when he was handed a drive-through penalty for jumping the start. Meanwhile, having started from 15th and 19th (last!) positions respectively, both Rob Collard and Jason Plato made quick progress through the pack in the early stages of the race. Collard was eighth and Plato 12th at the end of lap three.

Lap five brought retirement for Mat Jackson. The Racing Silverline driver was running second when he slowed with a gearbox problem. His teammate Plato was into the top ten by lap six, but his progress was far from over. He dispatched James Nash and Rob Collard before coming up on the back of James Thompson in sixth.

Team Sunshine.co.uk’s Paul O’Neill was enjoying another excellent race, running in third once again. During the latter stages of the race he came under pressure from the two quick drivers behind him – James Thompson and Jason Plato. Plato had by now passed Harry Vaulkhard and Jonny Adam to make it to fifth.

Thompson was biding his time as he looked for a way past his good friend O’Neill, but in the end he ran too close to the Integra exiting Sear, allowing Plato to carry more speed onto the straight. Past Thompson, Plato took a couple of laps to edge out O’Neill, but again it was the Chevrolet’s pace out of Sear that carried him past – and up to third. But it was there that Plato’s progress came to an end. Despite closing on Colin Turkington, he could not get close enough to make a passing attempt.

At the end of 18 laps, Giovanardi took the win ahead of Turkington and Plato. Thompson finished fourth with O’Neill ending up fifth. Jonny Adam and Rob Collard finished sixth and seventh respectively for Airwaves BMW, ahead of James Nash, Harry Vaulkhard and Gordon Shedden.

Allan McNish made the draw for the race-three reverse grid, and selected the number nine card, putting Harry Vaulkhard on pole position.