Jack Goff was encouraged by the outright pace of West Surrey Racing‘s BMW after a hat-trick of strong finishes at Donington Park moved him up to third in the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship standings.
The IHG® Rewards Club-backed driver grabbed results of fourth, fifth and sixth during Sunday’s trio of races at Donington, battling for the lead in the third encounter of the afternoon.
That 16-lap thriller saw Goff tail WSR team-mate Sam Tordoff for much of the race, only for the former to drop to sixth as both BMWs dropped off the pace with soft tyre degradation.
“It was tense”, Goff told The Checkered Flag afterwards. “It was. In the last seven laps I was holding on basically.
“I was wishing the laps away. This is what we expect with the soft tyre though.
“Maybe I pushed too hard. I’m still getting used to this car, as well as running with it on soft tyres so, for me, it’s still a learning curve.”
The BMW pairing of Tordoff and Goff were swallowed up by their Honda rivals in the latter half of the race, although the performance of the 125i on the more popular medium compound tyre earlier in the afternoon was what encouraged Goff most of all.
“[Honda] were quick, but to be fair, they had no ballast on and the medium tyre”, Goff said when asked of the team’s true pace.
“Earlier on when we were both on the medium tyre, I pulled away from Matt Neal. So I think we’re looking good.
“Three top sixes – it’s not bad at all. We’ve come away third in the championship and got a fastest lap in that race, which is two out of six so far.”
Goff enters the third round of the season at Thruxton on 7/8 May lying third in the championship after six races, 12 points adrift of series leader Neal heading to a circuit he remains cautious over.
“We want to get through Thruxton because I don’t know that place at all with this car, then we can work from there for the rest of the year.”
