Grand Prix Rejects

Curveball! Josh Cook's been signed by Maximum Motorsport for the full season, which means that Stewart bloody Lines is sticking to management.

There is a god. I just hope that five year old Focus of their's is still capable of running near the front. On the down side this means there are no more top drivers left for the 4th Subaru so they will definately have someone mediocre.

Also this means that the worst drivers we have on the grid this year are Cole, Depper and Jeff Smith which I can live with. The wooden spoon is going to be a hard pick. Well unless Howard blags himself that 4th Subaru as previously suggested.

The BTCC is now back up to five proper works teams for the first time in a very long while (1999?); WSR is now Team BMW, in the German manufacturer's first season as a works team since 1996. The new livery's pretty good too...

That is a lovely livery, glad they've brought that back. I always root for the Hondas, but I think I may have to cheer on 2 of the BMW drivers as well (not Jordan though)

Barbazza wrote:I think I may have to cheer on 2 of the BMW drivers as well (not Jordan though)

Same here, except with Collard instead of Jordan

Salamander wrote:

Barbazza wrote:I think I may have to cheer on 2 of the BMW drivers as well (not Jordan though)

Same here, except with Collard instead of Jordan

Yay! Turks, the works driver!!!

It's official, Warren Scott has finally given up the 4th BMR seat as he has decided that since he spends more time off road anyway he may as well switch to Rallycross.
http://www.btcccrazy.co.uk/btcc/warren- ... btcc-seat/

I just hope his replacement isn't Mark Howard.

He's decided to team up with Liam Doran too, so he might actually seem competent and likeable compared to his teammates for once...

Media Day and the 4th BMR Subaru goes to....

Josh Price, who had only recently been announced as a BMR academy driver in the Clio Cup. Sounds good to me, at least its not wasted on a random pay driver. He and Senna Proctor will be the youngest drivers in the series at 18 years old.

http://www.btcccrazy.co.uk/btcc/team-bm ... rg-driver/

Season opener this weekend and Jeff freaking Smith is on pole.

And Matt Simpson somehow made the top 10. Plato is down in 18th. In fact all the Subarus did horribly.

Samster wrote:Season opener this weekend and Jeff freaking Smith is on pole.

And Matt Simpson somehow made the top 10. Plato is down in 18th. In fact all the Subarus did horribly.

It rained during the session apparently. Jeff smith leading the championship.....

I didn't think Matt Neal would ever do anything more stupid than taking himself and his teammate out of a 1-2 finish on the last corner of the last lap... but then he goes and takes himself and Turkington out before the first corner of the first lap.

Bet you he won't get punished. He never does,

Despite suffering from industrial strength manflu, Tom Ingram takes the first race of 2017. Massive shoutout to Michael Epps, a superb drive in that VW barge.

Meanwhile, Subarus finished 12th, 16th, 24th and 27th , whilst Neal's move at the start is the most moronic thing I've seen in motorsports for quite some time.

Yeah, Matt Neal with the most retarded move you'll see in the BTCC all year. What a numpty.

Shame to see Jeff Smith drop back, but great for Ingram. Jordan looking good in the BMW, good result for Morgan too. Vauxhall seem to be generally on the pace too which is promising.

I see the Plato-Neal rivalry is still alive and well - not content to let his longtime foe have the title of "Stupidest Move of the Year", Plato proceeds to do exactly the same thing in race 2, only with more damage caused.

It's quite something when the two most experienced drivers in the field make the EXACT same moronic move at the start. Good going, well played lads.

Would be nice if rob Austin would occasionally overtake without driving into the back of the other driver.

Apologies for the double post, but Rob Austin Has been disqualified from race two for hitting and passing Jordan under double waved yellows.

andrew wrote:Apologies for the double post, but Rob Austin Has been disqualified from race two for hitting and passing Jordan under double waved yellows.

Apparently the stewards took notice of your previous post.

Salamander wrote:

andrew wrote:Apologies for the double post, but Rob Austin Has been disqualified from race two for hitting and passing Jordan under double waved yellows.

Apparently the stewards took notice of your previous post.

Haha true, unfortunately also took notice of my Matt Neal post (Ie he wouldn't be punished)

Great opening weekend at brands hatch. 3 different winners and 7 different men on the podium. BMW may have an older car but it seems that the works involvement has taken them to a strong level. I think they could be the early favourites for the manufacturer title.

I bet Turkington is laughing his head off seeing Plato and Subaru's struggles while he will be fighting for the title. It's no less than Plato deserves after turfing him out. Rob Austin was very honest about his exclusion and I admire that greatly

Freeze-O-Kimi wrote:Great opening weekend at brands hatch. 3 different winners and 7 different men on the podium. BMW may have an older car but it seems that the works involvement has taken them to a strong level. I think they could be the early favourites for the manufacturer title.

I bet Turkington is laughing his head off seeing Plato and Subaru's struggles while he will be fighting for the title. It's no less than Plato deserves after turfing him out. Rob Austin was very honest about his exclusion and I admire that greatly

Chuffed to see a strong BMW, if only as to increase Jordan's chances of title #2. God I love the Pirtek livery.

Agree with you on the Plato point, always found him to be an arse so to see him way down the field is quite amusing.

Finally caught up on last weekend. My god Neal and Plato's crashes were dumb. Still cannot wait for both to finally retire. No doubt ITV will mourn their careers to death when that time comes though.

Onto the positives, how about Michael Epps? Top 10 in all three races!

Matt Simpson surprisingly backed up his top ten qualifying effort by only dropping to 11th in race 1, and then Plato ruined the rest of his weekend.

Senna Proctor surprised me too by being the top rookie each race. The other Jack Sears contenders just seemed to get beat up all day.

Josh Cook's 7th place was a nice surprise too. Nice to see Team Parker seem to be capable of competing near the front now that they have competent drivers.

The Subarus and MGs were shockingly well down all day, not a top 10 between them. Same for Moffat who had a shocker of a weekend.

And the way Turkington recovered from starting last in race 2 to 2nd by the end of race 3 despite not benefiting from the reverse grid. Safe to say, he is the favourite this year.

Samster wrote:Finally caught up on last weekend. My god Neal and Plato's crashes were dumb. Still cannot wait for both to finally retire. No doubt ITV will mourn their careers to death when that time comes though.

Be careful what you wish for. They might end up as ITV pundits alongside Tim Harvey and Paul O'Neill!

dr-baker wrote:Be careful what you wish for. They might end up as ITV pundits alongside Tim Harvey and Paul O'Neill!

They'd wind up throttling each other on live TV, I'd pay good money to see that.

The Stewards decisions have been released with 7 drivers penalised over the weekend, and Suprise Suprise none of them Are Neal and to a lesser extent Plato. Seriously what does Neal have to do to get punished, 2015 at Donington he punts Jordan out the way, no punishment despite drivers being punished for far less. Thruxton last year when Neal caused an enourmas crash and the went on to blame a driver who was already out the race if my memory serves me correctly. Seriously! Punish these 2 when they cause crashes!

On a lighter note. Well done to David Kajaia for winning Race 1 of the a
TCR series in Georgia in the Alfa, finally the Alfa won!

I've always been a Honda and Matt Neal fan (like no-one else on this forum it seems!) but I do think that he's lost his touch and should probably now call it a day, demonstrated by that Race 1 performance. Mind you, so should Plato and if anything I think his Race 2 start was even more stupid.

Speaking of Mr. Neal, god knows why he still turns up to commentate on WTCC on Eurosport alongside Martin 'Never been a professional racing driver but I know much more than YOU and will SHOUT over whatever you say' Haven. There's someone who really should bloody retire.

WTCC is now a total crapfest - just 15 cars in the first race, with all of those finishing scoring points. Laughably, Haven was bigging up Aurelien Panis because he scored a point on his debut. Yeah, by virtue of still running at the end despite being rather slow, you fat faced dope. There was an interesting and - I'm fairly certain - incorrect pronunciation of 'Guerreri' throughout too. The circuit barely allowed any overtaking whatsoever so trust me, don't bother with the highlights.

andrew wrote:The Stewards decisions have been released with 7 drivers penalised over the weekend, and Suprise Suprise none of them Are Neal and to a lesser extent Plato. Seriously what does Neal have to do to get punished, 2015 at Donington he punts Jordan out the way, no punishment despite drivers being punished for far less. Thruxton last year when Neal caused an enourmas crash and the went on to blame a driver who was already out the race if my memory serves me correctly. Seriously! Punish these 2 when they cause crashes!

On a lighter note. Well done to David Kajaia for winning Race 1 of the a
TCR series in Georgia in the Alfa, finally the Alfa won!

That stunt at Thruxton was the worst for me - trying to access the pitlane across the pack - really?!

I didn't watch it but I've just gone to the BTCC website to see what happened in qualifying.

Ash Sutton got pole but was disqualified for turbo overboost - which could have been deduced by any sane person given that he was 0.6 seconds quicker than the next fastest Subaru (Plato) - obviously Warren Scott is getting a bit desperate....

GET IN THERE AIDEN MOFFAT

I'm torn between Moffat's move on Ingram in the Craner Curves or Morgan's no holds-barred move on Shedden going into Redgate for best overtake of the season so far.

ROTR has to be the imbeciles driving the MGs, what the bloody hell were they trying to achieve? BMR were hilariously awful once again though.

East Londoner wrote:I'm torn between Moffat's move on Ingram in the Craner Curves or Morgan's no holds-barred move on Shedden going into Redgate for best overtake of the season so far.

Moffat's move on Ingram was fantastic, he drove superbly all race. His overtake on Austin was a nice move too, outbraking Austin from so far back. Brilliant race from him.

Horrendous accident in the British F4 race just now. Billy Monger was unsighted and plowed into the back of a broken down car at pretty much top speed. The fact ITV have gone over to highlights of earlier races is not a good sign at all. Really hope both drivers are OK.

East Londoner wrote:Horrendous accident in the British F4 race just now. Billy Monger was unsighted and plowed into the back of a broken down car at pretty much top speed. The fact ITV have gone over to highlights of earlier races is not a good sign at all. Really hope both drivers are OK.

I'm at the track now, was just out of sight of that but certainly within earshot and it sounded like a bomb had gone off. Everyone near me went over to see what happened. On the plus side both drivers appeared to be moving inside the cars but they were completely tangled up.

First lap mayhem.

Finally finished watching the BTCC races from last weekend.

Nice stitch-up on the Hondas in the last race, stewards!
If someone can explain to me why Matt Neal wasn't allowed to start the second time in the final race when the first attempt was declared null and void, I'd love to hear it. And as for Shedden being disqualified for failing the ride height test - well, yeah, because it was falling apart! Surely most of the other cars would have failed that too?

Utter bollocks - they've obviously decided they're going to fix it so someone else wins this year. Gow = Bernie, I've always said it.

On Matt Neal I would say regulation 3.8.1a covers this:
Any car unable to return to the Pits under its own power and/or who has caused a stoppage to a practice or qualifying session or Race, may not be permitted to take further part in that session or race.

Ie he didn't return under his own power is what I would assume, On Shedden, the car was illegal, it doesn't matter how it became illegal, illegal is illegal they had to disqualify him.

We're never going to totally agree on this andrew, since I know that you really don't like the Honda drivers and I do!

However....on Matt Neal, OK, that makes sense if that's what the regulation says.

On Shedden..yes, I know rules is rules and all that but it's happened before to other drivers and I just think it's daft that in a sport where there's lot of contact in every race that there is no leeway for car damage whatsoever.

Barbazza wrote:We're never going to totally agree on this andrew, since I know that you really don't like the Honda drivers and I do!

However....on Matt Neal, OK, that makes sense if that's what the regulation says.

On Shedden..yes, I know rules is rules and all that but it's happened before to other drivers and I just think it's daft that in a sport where there's lot of contact in every race that there is no leeway for car damage whatsoever.

I agree with you in the sense that it did seem strange that Neal wasn't allowed to start, but when looking at the regulations it made sense. On Shedden, I personally have seen any Indication that the ride height deficit was caused by accident damage. This may just me being ignorant. Do you have a source saying that it as accident damage? If so, for me this would change it slightly (that is if Honda or any team involved can prove the car was legal at the start)

andrew wrote:[I agree with you in the sense that it did seem strange that Neal wasn't allowed to start, but when looking at the regulations it made sense. On Shedden, I personally have seen any Indication that the ride height deficit was caused by accident damage. This may just me being ignorant. Do you have a source saying that it as accident damage? If so, for me this would change it slightly (that is if Honda or any team involved can prove the car was legal at the start)

The post-race interview with Gordon mentioned accident damage, and although you could argue that he would say that, during the chat afterwards with Paul O'Neill and Tim Harvey they were talking about accident damage as if it was a fact rather than speculative. O'Neill in particular strongly suggested that Honda had a case for appeal. But has an appeal against a BTCC stewards decision EVER worked?!

At least a decent driver is leading the championship as a result of the disqualification.
And at least Plato is nowhere. I'm still extremely suspicious of the much better performance of Sutton's Subaru though - would the stewards care to take a good look at that again....?