Ollie Pidgley continues to show improvement in the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship as the Trade Price Cars with Brisky Racing driver scored his first top twenty finish in the series at Silverstone.
With an all new look to the Team HARD Volkswagens, the change in colour scheme seemed to have an effect in qualifying where Ollie was just 0.8 seconds off pole position. Albeit in twenty-ninth position.
After gaining three positions on the second lap of race one, Ollie made progress further through the field until the safety-car came out on lap five. By then he had worked his way into twenty-fifth.
With drivers ahead hitting trouble, Ollie found himself in twenty-first before a move on the Audi of Sam Smelt gave him twentieth. With a few laps remaining and the quick Ford Focus RS of James Cole behind. Ollie kept his nerve to score his best ever BTCC finish.
With hopes of breaking the top fifteen in race two, Ollie was to hit the marbles on the outside of Becketts on lap one and spin onto the grass. This practically dropped the twenty-one year old to last in the field.
However, this didn’t deter the rookie as he used the top speed of his Volkswagen CC to full use and he sped his way into twenty-third position. A pretty valiant effort considering the strife he was in on lap one. He also finished just 0.4 seconds away from 2013 BTCC champion Andrew Jordan.
Credit: Jakob Ebrey Photography
With the unfavourable tyre on his car for race three, progress was going to be difficult and he dropped from twenty-third to twenty-seventh on lap one.
Sadly, on lap seven, progress was halted when Sam Smelt made contact with the rear of the VW breaking Ollie’s right rear suspension. This pitched the car off track and into the barrier at Woodcote. The damage was too great and Ollie had to retire on the spot.
Despite disappointment in the final race, Ollie was still pleased with his weekend,
“In the races it was standard Silverstone really, lots of action and contact as there’s nowhere you can cleanly overtake without someone leaning on you.
“Our car is quick in a straight line, so that made it easier to defend and to also try and make places up. I was really happy with the result in race one, it’s just a shame about the problems in the other two races as we definitely had good pace.”
