Rob Collard fought to victory in the third Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship race of the day at Croft, making sure West Surrey Racing‘s trio took a win apiece.
Following a feisty battle in race two, pole-sitter Collard and Honda Yuasa Racing‘s Gordon Shedden continued their duel into race three at the North Yorkshire circuit, Collard leading into the first corner ahead of team-mate, Andy Priaulx.
Priaulx was quickly usurped by Shedden on the opening lap, before the soft tyre-shod Civic Type-R moved up onto Collard’s tail and then took over the lead exiting Tower Bend on lap three.
The Scot’s tyres eventually began to fade as the race went on, and by the 10th lap of 15 the BMW man was on his rival’s rear bumper.
Collard made his move with a tighter line heading into the fast chicane on lap 12, moving into the lead which he would not lose on the way to a second win of the season by over seven seconds.
WSR’s fabulous Croft weekend ended in style as a one-two finish was earned by Priaulx in the final complex, Shedden’s hard, but fair defensive efforts eventually usurped as the BMW powered into second heading into the final hairpin.
A distant fourth was Colin Turkington ahead of team-mate Jason Plato, while Sam Tordoff made his way up to sixth spot behind the Team BMR duo to cap off a fine weekend for the local driver.
Tom Ingram made it a hat-trick of top-10 finishes at Croft with seventh, the Speedworks man finishing ahead of Jack Goff (MG), Matt Neal (Honda) and Warren Scott (Volkswagen).
Rob Austin and Alex Martin were two to retire with damage from incidents in the final race, Mike Bushell not making it out due to an engine problem.