Struggle for Rob Smith in the rain at Croft

The Excelr8 Motorsport driver retained 13th position in the Independents Trophy standings – the highest placed BTCC rookie – on a challenging weekend at Croft in North Yorkshire which was impacted by intermittent heavy rain.

The MG6 racer from Telford also maintained his placing of equal third in the Jack Sears Trophy battle.

While the fourth meeting of the campaign wasn’t quite as fruitful as Smith wanted, he was happy with progress made behind the scenes and especially at a track he has less experience of.

“It’s been a more positive weekend than it’s looked from the outside,” said Smith.

“We’ve had a new engineer working on the car, with some quite drastic changes made, so we’ve taken a step back to ultimately move five or six steps further forward.

“I was quite aware there was a decent chunk of time in me, rather than the car, as I don’t have that much experience at Croft.

“Overall, I was happy with the car and feel I’ve gelled with it more in my natural driving style.

“So when we go to Oulton in a couple of weeks at least we’ll be at a track I know and we can carry on the developments. The aim is to be back where we were at Brands and Donington at least.”

Nobody could have predicted how the qualifying session would turn out with as many as five red flag stoppages ruining the flow and meaning drivers struggled to piece together clear laps. Smith ended up with the 25th fastest time overall, 15th quickest of the independents.

Smith finished in 22nd spot in round 10 before finishing two places lower after making a slow start to round 11.

Heavy rain prior to round 12 meant a wet, but drying, track awaited competitors and from 24th on the grid Smith made a great start – gaining no fewer than six places on the first lap to climb into 18th.

With the track improving during the closing stages, drivers who gambled on dry weather tyres began to enjoy better pace and on lap 13 Smith was passed by the slick-shod Toyota of Tom Ingram at Tower Bend – triggering a loss of more places after running wide on mud.

Slipping to 22nd spot as a result, and 14th in the independents battle, he stayed there to the chequered flag on lap 17.

Smith now looks ahead to his first visit as a BTCC driver to his ‘home’ track, Oulton Park in Cheshire, on the weekend of June 29 and 30.