Martin Byford today embarked on his Dunlop MSA British Touring Car debut as he took to the track in the AmD Milltek Racing.com Volkswagen Golf in both free practice sessions today.

Byford, who comes from the Britcar championship series, managed to set the 12th and then 10th fastest times during both free practice one and two and shaved over one second off his time in-between sessions in only the second competitive outing in the car.

I’ts better than I was expecting,” said Byford. “We made a quite a lot of changes between the sessions as the handling wasn’t quite how we wanted it so the guys sat down and looked at the data and they’ve got the car closer to where I want it.”

He went on to say, “I don’t know whether or not we can hold on to that sort of pace into qualifying is yet to be known.”

Martin Byford takes over from team boss, Shaun Hollamby, who took to the wheel during the previous round of the season at Croft. Byford isn’t unfamiliar with the TOCA package after taking the championship title in the Renault Clio Cup in 2007 but finds it strange being in the BTCC pit-lane.

“I’m still learning and I know I’ve got loads to learn. It’s great to be involved with the BTCC and I have to keep pinching myself to tell myself I’m in the BTCC.”

“I’ve stepped into the unknown today and I didn’t really know how it was all going to work or where we were going to be but when I saw that I was 12th and then 10th I was pleasantly surprised.”

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.