Plato on pole for 500th BTCC raceposted in BTCC13 | 08 | 2016
DOUBLE CHAMP JASON PLATO will start his 500th British Touring Car Championship race from pole position tomorrow after a stunning last-lap performance at Knockhill.
Plato, who has yet to win this season in his new Subaru Levorg, left it late to top the timesheets at the 1.2-mile circuit near Dunfermline.
In the final seconds of the session, Tom Ingram held provisional pole in his Toyota Avensis with a time of 51.542secs. But Plato saved his best till last, shaving 0.021s off Ingram’s time.
“That was good,” Plato, who will start the day’s opening race eyeing the 95th win of his BTCC career, beamed after sealing his 49th pole. “It was late, and close, but we got the job done.
“Going into the last lap I knew I had the pace in the car; we just had to get a clean lap in around here with the traffic. Every one I did was getting spoiled in one way or another. I’m chuffed with that and I think I’ll get a strong start tomorrow.
“Everything has to be perfect around here. I was relieved to get the lap in and had I not got pole I’d have been frustrated. We’ve got a good balance and we’re in good shape.
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“I knew coming into the weekend we had a really strong chance of getting pole, and that’s exactly what we’ve achieved. Now I just need to do the job in the opening race tomorrow.”
While championship leader Rob Collard struggled to qualify 18th in his BMW, Sam Tordoff — who enters the weekend just three points off the lead in the title race — lines up third alongside fellow BMW driver Jack Goff.
So competitive is the field that all four fastest cars ducked under the previous qualifying record at Knockhill, and the top 26 cars were covered by just 0.996s.
Double champ Gordon Shedden, whose Honda Civic is carrying 48kg ‘success’ ballast for the first of the three races, starts 11th. The 37-year-old from Auchterarder’s Honda was hampered by a turbo boost leak
"I think it’s fair to say we were about 20 or 30 horsepower down,” Shedden, who is sandwiched between two other Scots on the grid, explained. “There was just no boost. We’ve a lot of work to do tonight and tomorrow.”
While Inverness-based Dave Newsham — on his one-off appearance this season, deputising for Kelvin Fletcher, whose wife is having a baby — qualified his Chevrolet Cruze 10th, Dalkeith 19-year-old Aiden Moffat starts 12th in his Mercedes.
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Jim McGill