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Gordon Shedden says there’s still plenty of time to recover from the ground he lost in this year’s HiQ MSA British Touring Car Championship title race at Brands Hatch... beginning at Rockingham this weekend.
 The Scot is now in his third BTCC season with Team Halfords which gave him his break in 2006 and in that time he has matured into one of the championship’s true star drivers – he looked more likely than anyone last year to have the pace to win all three races in a day (at Knockhill) and, even with ten non-scores/retirements, still finished a superb third in the final standings.
His 2008 campaign got off to a tricky start at Brands – a fine second in race two was followed by a retirement in race three after contact with Adam Jones’ privately-entered SEAT, thus meaning he goes into this Sunday’s three Rockingham rounds sixth in the standings, already some 20 points off leader Fabrizio Giovanardi.
Shedden told BTCC.net: “The incident at Brands was frustrating as Adam (Jones) effectively used me as a brake – he went into Druids way too quickly and took me off. I don’t think it was blatant; he just made a mistake. I’d already had a narrow escape when I got turned into Tom (Onslow-Cole) by (Jason) Plato and skimmed the barriers. It was a race to forget as soon as the lights went out.
“But I don’t want to dwell on it. It’s done. Rockingham is next and it’s where I think we can score a lot of points. We were quite happy with the car there on Media Day in March which was probably not reflected in our position in the times and I know we’ll be more competitive at Rockingham than at Brands any way.
“One DNF at this stage isn’t that much of a problem. There’s plenty of time to claw it back and for things to happen.”
Nor does Shedden see the fact that Giovanardi has had a much stronger start to his 2008 campaign than last year as a major worry… yet.
He added: “Sure, Fabrizio had a very strong weekend at Brands, but I certainly don’t see him walking away with it. It is tougher out there than in 2007. We made a load of progress during the winter with our car but we’ve found, predictably, so have the others. And there are more genuine front-running car/driver/team combinations this year…
“Despite my DNF, this is also actually the best start I’ve had to a BTCC season so far! I’ve got more points than I had this time last year so I have to try and make that count.
“Like I said, there’s still plenty of time to come back at them. This little Honda Civic we have will always be in there somewhere bobbing along in the pack and with a chance of podium results and wins.”
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