Best of the rest

[Dave B]

It's obviously Plato vs Giovanardi for the title, but the battle for 3rd is pretty close too.

Matt Neal was looking good until his Brands Hatch disaster, now team mate Shedden's ahead of him. Turkington's still in with a good chance, just a point behind Matt, and if Darren Turner has a good weekend and a little bit of luck he could even leapfrog the lot of them.

Who do you think will end up "best of the rest" this year?

[BDunnell]

Shedden, I reckon.

[VkmSpouge]

Shedden has a very healthy 16 point lead over Neal and 17 points over Turkington. I feel on balance Shedden deserves to be 3rd this season, he has driven exceedingly well all year. I reckon Turkington might just grab 4th place from Neal.

[Ian McC]

May depend on if they can get round the set up problems TD had on Neals car all weekend, certainly showed in the last race when he was going into certain corners.

[SEATFreak]

It is deffinitely one from the two TD drivers. I think Turks is out. Though I think, providing the standings on btccpages.com has been updated, he could yet nick 4th spot.

[thompp]

Shedden has a very healthy 16 point lead over Neal and 17 points over Turkington. I feel on balance Shedden deserves to be 3rd this season, he has driven exceedingly well all year. I reckon Turkington might just grab 4th place from Neal.

Given the one point difference, CT has a very good chance of grabbing fourth from Matt. Watch out for a Matt v Colin contest at Thruxton....!

[Iain]

I just hope the Dunlops are working a bit better this time round for the BMWs. :s

[ATF]

Me too Iain - and if it does, it might knock SEAT a bit down the order...although they said their car wouldn't suit Thruxton last time and ended up winning anyway!!

Think Shedden and Turkington have been the best of the rest this season - with reliability and luck on their side this year, it could have been a 4-way title race! And some experts even tipped Turner for the title this year, maybe next year he will be more of a threat?!

[SEATFreak]

Think Shedden and Turkington have been the best of the rest this season - with reliability and luck on their side this year, it could have been a 4-way title race!

And fast too. They have been particularly strong when it comes to achieving the fastest times for races.

Indeed at Knockhill both Turks and Shedden achieved the two fastest times in both races 1 and 2 whilst 'Flash' achieved a fast time in race 3. Turks achieving 53.822 and 53.271 and 'Flash' achieving 53.313 and 53.470 in races 1 and 2 respectively. Flash achieing 53.340 in race 3.

Indeed, since round 1 Turks has achieved a fastest time 8 times and Flash' 6 times. And if I am right nobody has achieved fastest times more times than either.


And some experts even tipped Turner for the title this year, maybe next year he will be more of a threat?!

I hope so. He is an immensley talented driver. The only thing I can suggest for his lack of strong form is maybe he needs getting used to a Leon. He is used to GT's and single seaters but the tourers are, I think, different. Before this season he only did 8 races in 2006.

Here's to 2008 Darren.

[VXRDartford]

Sorry but I can't ever see darren turner winning the title. He is a very good driver but he lets people past too easily. When i was a snetterton at the esses he did not even try and defend when a couple or drivers went to pass him. If he gets a bit more aggressive in that respect I think he could challenge. We shall see

[ATF]

To be fair to Darren, this is his first full BTCC season. Maybe he doesn't want to get caught up in accidents and let SEAT down when he can just keep scoring points towards the manufacturers championship? Hope SEAT retain him next year...and drop Plato!! ;)

[SEATFreak]

Sorry but I can't ever see darren turner winning the title. He is a very good driver but he lets people past too easily. When i was a snetterton at the esses he did not even try and defend when a couple or drivers went to pass him. If he gets a bit more aggressive in that respect I think he could challenge. We shall see

Nor do I but then I personally don't expect drivers to win the title in order to prove to me their a very good driver. Just show they can race with the best consistently and show they can win the title.

Look at 'Flash', credit to him he is a top driver, yet he hasn't won the title yet.


To be fair to Darren, this is his first full BTCC season. Maybe he doesn't want to get caught up in accidents and let SEAT down when he can just keep scoring points towards the manufacturers championship? Hope SEAT retain him next year...and drop Plato!! ;)

As I said before he has only raced 8 - only 4 meetings - in the Leon before this season. I fully expect him as a fan of the team to be more aclimatised to the team even more than this season.

I agree with you that perhaps he has a hesitancy to get do something that would cause an accident. Because perhaps even though he knows he wasn't going to be in the running to win the title he did know his points would very useful to the team.

Drop Jase'? Tell you what! That ain't a bad idea! He is a very good competitor and it would be hard to find a driver with his fighting spirit but SEAT can attract quality. VXR attracted a top WTCC talent in Fabrizio Giovanardi. Surely SEAT can too?

[BTCC2]

I think it will be Flash.

[ATF]

As I said before he has only raced 8 - only 4 meetings - in the Leon before this season.

He did 5 last season - the fifth being the Silverstone finale which both he and Jimmy T did!

[Hazell B]

Shedden's got the best chance, but I'd rather see Darren Turner clamber past the lot of them.

[Winchester]

Turkington, Shedden for me... also Adam Jones, probably the biggest impression of anyone this year. Lots of people thought Mat Jackson would be good but not many people would have said the same for Jones unless they looked carefully at what he did with that awful Lexus last year.
But obviously he isn't going to finish 3rd in the championship!

[MBailey06]

Going back to Adam Jones briefly, its amazing that he is only 41 points behind Tom Onslow-Cole in the championship, even though he has done fewer rounds and in an older car.