Mat Jackson: “It’s been a great year for Motorbase”

Mat Jackson insists that Motorbase can be proud of its performance on track this season regardless of the outcome of this weekend’s BTCC finale at Brands Hatch.

The Ford team has already wrapped up both Independents titles going into the final three races of the season, although it remains to be seen whether Jackson or team-mate Andrew Jordan will take the Independents Drivers’ crown.

Jackson himself is the better placed of the pair in the overall championship but still sits 21 points behind current leader Sam Tordoff, despite winning more races than anyone else this season.

It means Jackson goes into the weekend insisting that the pressure is off with the title being down to others to lose more than him to win.

“It’s great to be going into this weekend with the championship race still so close,” he said. “Being P5 in the standings means we’re carrying less ballast into qualifying and being only ten points off second place puts us in a great place. This is the strongest position we’ve ever been in heading into the final round and it tops off a great year for Motorbase.

“It’s been an interesting year for a lot of the guys in the championship and it’s kept it very, very close at the top. With eight drivers in contention going into the final it shows what a strong year it’s been but all the pressure is on Sam to not make a mistake this weekend. We’ve just got to treat it as a normal weekend.

“We haven’t got any pressure on us; all we can do is go for wins and bank the points. It’s down to the others to lose it more than it is for us to win it. We need to make sure that qualifying goes to plan so we can hit the ground running in race one and deliver the results from there.”