2007 MSA British Rallycross Champion Ollie O’Donovan achieved his goal of taking a podium finish at the Maasmechelen round in the 2016 MSA British Rallycross Championship and boosted his chances of fighting for the MSA Supercar title in the process.
O’Donovan used consistency to his advantage as he went fourth fastest in Q1 which took place on Saturday evening and then proceeded to improve to second fastest overall in Q2 behind championship leader Dan Rooke. He continued this pace to go third fastest in Q3 which meant that the London based Irishman finished in second place overall at the Intermediate stage and this allowed him to qualify for the Semi-Finals where he finished in second place behind race winner Julian Godfrey. In the final, O’Donovan became involved in a battle for third place with Pat Doran, the Irishman using his joker lap at the right moment to come out on top when Doran took his joker on the final lap, which confirmed him in third place behind Rooke and Godfrey.
This podium finish in the Tony Bardy Motorsport prepared Team RX Racing Ford Focus means that O’Donovan is now tied for third place in the Drivers Championship with Dave Bellerby and this offers the chance of fighting for a second British RX title as the series moves to Lydden Hill on 29th August.
O’Donovan is happy with his weekends work but is also wary of the task ahead as he explains:
“It was a pretty good weekend for us. We had good speed every time we went on the track,” said O’Donovan. “I rubbed the wall on the inside of one of the hairpins in the final but I’m happy enough with the result. Of course we are here to win, but it just wasn’t my weekend on that front.
“To be honest, if we have any chance at all of capitalising in the championship if Julian or Dan have a poor event, we need to be getting good points at every round now. Pushing too hard to gain one or two positions and risk something silly was not in our game plan at all this weekend.
“The Focus is running well again and she looks lovely in the new livery. We’ll work hard before Lydden next month and go there wanting to make up for retiring from the lead of the final there earlier in the year.”
The next round at Lydden Hill saw O’Donovan take an exciting victory in his Ford Fiesta ahead of Kevin Proctor and Andy Scott in 2015 and the former British RX Champion will looking to score big points again.
