Colin Turkington tops Donington Park test times
Colin Turkington topped the times for West Surrey Racing in the first of three official tests ahead of the new BTCC season.
The Donington Park session was used by the majority of the field to work on installation and initial running of the new Cosworth hybrid system that will be introduced into the BTCC this season, with the majority of the 23 cars that turned laps over the course of the day doing so with the system in place.
It is expected that the remainder of the field will have hybrid power in place ahead of the Croft test on 6 April.
Turkington led the way during both the morning and afternoon sessions in his BMW 330e M Sport on what was his first day running under hybrid power, although the differing programmes being run across the paddock mean little can be be learned from the times set.
“It’s great just to get back in the car, it feels like it’s been a long time,” said Turkington. “It was my first experience of hybrid and you definitely feel a difference in terms of power once you deploy. We still have to focus on the handling and the chassis, though, that’s still number one. We want to make the car quicker and make it mechanically better, and with the hybrid system on top of that, we’ll have a fast package.
“Team BMW has worked extremely hard through the winter to make sure we can hit the ground running, so reliability was always going to be a factor to consider, but my car ran faultlessly today which has allowed us to get through our test programme.
“We’re all still a bit green on the hybrid side of things and when’s the best moment to use it. It’s still a lot of experimenting and we tried a lot of different solutions today, so it was productive and gives us a lot of data to look through before the next test at Croft.”
Gordon Shedden would end up second quickest in his Team Dynamics Honda with a best time a tenth of a second off the pace, with Tom Ingram’s Hyundai slotting into third spot.
The returning Dan Cammish followed behind, with Adam Morgan and Jake Hill ensuring that three BMWs finished the day inside the top six.
Josh Cook celebrated his new deal with BTC Racing by going seventh quickest ahead of defending champion Ash Sutton, with Dan Rowbottom and series newcomer George Gamble rounding out the top ten.
Elsewhere, two drivers not yet signed for the 2022 season also turned laps on track in the shape of Jason Plato and Ricky Collard.
Plato would end up 16th on the times in BTC Racing’s third Honda, leaving him two spots behind Collard’s Speedworks-run Toyota – which completed a session high 73 laps in the afternoon.
