Tom Chilton claims pole for Team Aon

Tom Chilton continued with the excellent speed he showed in the second practice session, by claiming an excellent pole position for the opening race on Sunday.

Chilton lapped the Brands Hatch Grand Prix circuit in a time of 1:33.159, as the pace of the Focus again impressed.

The fine lap by Chilton has given Team Aon, and the Ford Focus, it’s first British Touring Car Championship pole position.

Jason Plato continued his impressive pace, again featuring high on the timing screens as he qualified his Chevrolet Lacetii second, 0.021 seconds behind Chilton.

Of the two championship front runners, it will be Fabrizio Giovanardi who will be the happiest with his qualifying performance.

The double champion qualified third on the circuit he had not raced on for some 20 years.

To add to his strong performance, he will be more than happy with the effort of his two team mates.

Matt Neal and Andrew Jordan qualified right behind Giovanardi in 4th and 5th respectively, meaning that he has an added bonus of the pair providing protection behind him during the first race.

Colin Turkington will not be happy with his performance in the session, as he could only manage tenth.

He would have also hoped for a better performance from his team mates, but Stephen Jelley and Anthony Reid were well down the running order. They will both start behind Turkington, and more importantly, behind the Vauxhalls.

The best placed BMW on the grid is that of Jonathan Adam in 7th, who has his Airwaves BMW team mate Rob Collard alongside.