Rob Collard will start tomorrow’s first race of the day in the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship from the second row of the grid after securing his best qualifying performance of the season in his West Surrey Racing prepared BMW.

For much of the session it looked as if the 42-year old would secure his first ever pole position of his career but in the end he had to settle for third after being dispossessed by both Plato and Neal.

“We’re very pleased with that,” said Collard. “We were quick in the wet and we’ve shown that we’re quick in the dry too. We knew we had a good balance but to be honest we were expecting the turbo’s to go a bit quicker.”

“There was a little bit of greasiness out there but we managed to get a lap set early and I was praying for it to rain or for a red flag because I had a sneaky suspicion that Jason [Plato] or Matt [Neal] would go out there right at the end which they did. We sat in the pits for a while and went out at the end but we just couldn’t better my lap. Full credit for the team.”

However, despite Collards pace in qualifying he still feels that tomorrow’s races will be a different story, especially with the speed of the turbo powered cars, and will be difficult to keep them at bay. “I was behind Shedden in qualifying and it’s easy to see their [Hondas] speed down the straights. I was fastest in free practice two but I was 17th fastest through the speed traps. The turbo’s are still frighteningly fast down the straights and if it’s dry tomorrow then they’re going to get us.”

Photo Credit: Pete Mainey (www.psmmotorsportimages.co.uk)

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.