Alan Gow today, speaking to crash.net, defended the decision that he made last week to introduce a spec- ratio on the first gear for all RWD entrants in the BTCC starting with next season.

“Perhaps many people forget that the BTCC is the only touring car championship – running to S2000 regulations – that does not have any rolling starts. All the others (such as the WTCC, Sweden, Denmark etc) introduced rolling starts some years ago in order to negate the clear BMW standing-start advantage. However, as we have seen, these rolling starts are often problematical and can result in quite substantial accident damage in the first corner due to the higher speeds,” he said speaking on the BTCC.net forum.

“Specialist computational analysis was carried out to determine a first gear ratio for them to use, which would mean that a rear-wheel-drive car would then have about the same initial acceleration (from a standing start) as that of a front-wheel-drive car. In that way, neither type of car would have an advantage or disadvantage off the line. We feel this is a more practical solution to the matter, rather than to go down the route of introducing rolling-starts and the significant issues (in both safety and costs) that they would also bring for many teams.”

As I said previously, I would have just rather seen them battle it out like they did this season but from Alan’s comments it’s clear to see that it’s not just a knee-jerk reaction and something that has been thoroughly thought. Only time will tell to see whether or not the changes are worth while.

James Mappin is the editor-in-chief covering the British Touring Car Championship. You can contact him at james@btcccrazy.co.uk, on twitter @BTCCCrazy or on his personal twitter account @jamesmappin.