Welch Motorsport have another eventful weekend at Oulton Park

Dan Welch and his Welch Motorsport crew had another eventful weekend at the British Touring Car Championship races at Oulton park earlier this month. The issues started before the weekend got underway as both trucks had issues getting to Oulton park in Cheshire. The 1st had a blown tyre at Warwick Services and the 2nd only got as far as Odiham before a clutch failure.

These were both sorted via major sponsor Sopp & Sopp, but delayed the preparation of the cars which meant these weren't finished until around 3am on the Saturday morning.

Qualifying on Saturday was trying to pull it all together but working on race pace rather than out and out single qualifying, do the team was happy with 13th place on the grid for race 1.

The opening race was a bit of a battle and so Dan only managed a 14th place finish.

The second race was a bit more eventful and Welch had a good strong run until he came up to Jeff Smith, in a Honda Civic, who he couldn't find a way past, until Smith made a mistake in Cascades and went out on the grass. With other cars dropping out this left Welch at 9th place at the flag.

After the reversed grid was drawn this left Welch on the front row of the grid and in a strong place for a good result. The image to the left shows the large amount of cars on the grid behind Welch.

After the lights went out Rob Austin in the rea wheel Audi managed to come around the 1st corner in the lead with Welch in 3rd place. Welch then had to keep the cars behind him whilst their soft tyres started to go off (which is what he did) So by lap 4 he had caught up the leading battle ahead and looked good for a great result. Unfortunately he then developed an issue with an overheating engine which sadly meant he had to retire.

He and the team were frustrated as they believed a win was possible from the position they were in.

The British Touring Car Championship now moves onto the North Yorkshire circuit of Croft with the next three races on Sunday 23rd June 2013

Here is the video from the Oulton Park weekend created by Melmo Films


Welch Motorsport have another eventful weekend at Oulton Park
WiderView Visual Media, Chris Roberts 17 June 2013
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