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Barrow-upon-Humber racer Martyn Bell achieved his aim of
three finishes at Rockingham on Sunday (13 April) on a difficult weekend of
racing in the HiQ MSA British Touring Car
Championship.
The
Arkas Racing with Sunshine.co.uk driver was forced to contend with mixed weather
conditions throughout the weekend at the Northamptonshire circuit, but managed
to secure his best finish to date with the Astra Sport Hatch to set him up well
for his home round at Donington Park next time
out.
Having lost valuable track time with a mechanical issue
in the second free practice session, the Tech-Speed team worked superbly to
replace the engine on Martyn’s car ahead of qualifying and he responded by
putting the Astra in 20th on the grid for race one after a session
that started wet before the circuit dried out.
Sunday’s opening race proved to be the opposite, as a
mid-race shower led to tricky conditions for the drivers on track, but Martyn
was able to come home in 18th place - just outside the Independents’
points scoring positions.
In
race two however, Martyn battled past the sister Arkas Racing car of team-mate
 Erkut Kizilirmak to take the final Independents’ point in 17th before
a torrential downpour hit the circuit as the field completed the green flag lap
ahead of the final race of the weekend.
After
the initial start was aborted, Martyn decided to start the race from the pitlane
to stay out of trouble and drove a careful race to ensure he brought the car
home in one piece, eventually taking the flag in twelfth – just two places shy
of an overall points finish.
“It’s
been a bit of a bittersweet weekend really, but it’s been ok,” he said. “It is
difficult to try and learn the car when it’s dry, never mind when you have the
kind of conditions we had over the weekend. We were caught out a little bit by
the shower in race one, but in the dry in race two, I got the hang of it again.
In race three, I had a full dry set-up on the car and I wasn’t prepared to put
it in the wall so I took it easy to just keep learning about the car and
learning about front-wheel drive.
“The
series is a marathon, not a sprint so we can examine what we have been able to
learn this weekend and now look forward to Donington Park, which is always special for me as
it’s the closest thing I have to a home race. Hopefully we’ll have some good
weather by then, but knowing the British climate, it’ll probably
snow!”
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