Leading up to the first round of the KwikFit British Touring Car Championship it was inevitable that there were lots of nerves building up for Scott! Racing in-front of a massive crowd, being on ITV4 and racing against some of the people he looked up to back in his early days of karting. Ultimately over the past 4+ years of saloon car racing, this is what it had built up to and it was Scott's dream to one day be in the BTCC.
In both FP1 and FP2 Scott was trying to get as many lap in as possible to get to grips and up to speed with the fast and flowing nature of Donington Park. In FP1 Scott was mainly bedding in tyres throughout the whole of the session. This is so when he puts the tyres on for qualifying or the race, they would have already had a heat cycle ran through them and be nicely bedded in. However, in FP2 he was allowed to push for the whole of the session and try and find vital time within himself.
Moving into his first ever BTCC qualifying! Nerves were of course through the roof and with the new 'quick six' qualifying system it only meant he would get 2 laps to try and put in a time. As Scott finished FP2 in P18 this meant he was in the evens group for qualifying, this meant he would be going out in group two as odds were first out on track. Just before qualifying kicked off there was a little shower of rain, and throughout the odd group the rain got worse. This meant Scott had to make the call whether to go on the slick or wet tyre... The rain got worse and worse therefore Scott went out on track early on with the wet tyre which seemed to look like the right call. Sitting in a nice P5 in group and with only a couple minutes left it was looking hopeful. But sadly with two minutes to go and other drivers going onto the slick tyre, the lap-times started dropping which meant Scott didn't get through to the next stage of Qualifying however he was still P15 overall!
Moving onto Sunday and it was looking very unlikely that there was going to be any racing whatsoever. Bad rain overnight and through to lunchtime it was looking like they were going boat racing. It was unsafe to send the cars out in the early morning to race as this could have caused a lot of damage to the cars. Therefore, at 11:45 the drivers were sent out for a 10-15 minute practice session to try and clear the track from standing water and to see if it was safe or not.
Thankfully the water cleared and this allowed us to go racing after all. With only 10-minutes notice Scott jumped into the Cupra Leon and was ready to go. This was good for Scott as he didn't have any time to think about what he was doing and all he had to do was go out and drive the best he can in the tricky wet conditions. After a decent get away from the line it was carnage down into turn one, spray was everywhere and Scott could barely see anything, but luckily he kept out of any carnage. Going down into turn three sadly one of Scott's competitors sadly got tagged and put into the wall, thankfully he was all okay but this left the race under safety-car for 17 laps. With only seven laps to go Scott tried his hardest to move forward, but with an understeering car this did not allow him to, therefore he had to settle with P17.
Race two was sadly one to forget about. Whilst reeling in the Cupra of Daryl De-Leon lap by lap, Scott suffered a issue with the hybrid radiator which meant he had to pit immediately so that the car didn't get damaged.
Starting the race in last position Scott was looking to push forward and get racing. After a good get away off the line and getting into the rhythm of things Scott was putting in some great lap times matching the top 10 in the race. With great laps times in the bag, he needed to get pass competitor Nick Halstead who put up a strong fight who made his Hyundai i30 as wide as possible. However with three laps to go Scott was able to save his hybrid and breeze up the inside of Halstead taking P16 which is where Scott went on to finish the race.
Overall (apart from the terrible weather) it was a great weekend at Donington Park. Lots learnt and definitely lots to take forward into the next round at Brands Hatch and throughout the rest of the season. Also, a massive thank you to SGS Engineering for coming along to the first round as well, it was amazing to have everyone there supporting Scott and hopefully everyone enjoyed it.
