British Touring Car Championship Series Director Alan Gow has strongly criticised Jason Plato for remarks made to the media at Knockhill.
Plato spoke out about the current engine regulations, despite taking pole position and victory in race one, whilst also scoring more points than any other driver during the weekend. Indeed, Plato’s haul of 53 points in Scotland is the joint most points scored by any driver in a race weekend this year.
Plato made remarks to TouringCars.Net after taking pole for his 500th race about a ‘lack of power’ in his Subaru Levorg GT – and now Gow has hit back at those comments, and others made during the live ITV4 broadcast.
“I’m just astounded at this latest round of moaning by Jason,” said Gow. “The fact of the matter is that he and his team would not be at anywhere near their current performance level, had it not been for the efforts of TOCA, all the BTCC teams and the Engine Technical Review Panel (ETRP).
“As their performances at the first two events highlighted, their inlet manifold originally homologated was just not capable of delivering the engine performance that their boost level was set to give. They would have had no choice but to make do with what they had for three years – the engine regulations state that certain major components, such as the inlet manifold, cannot be changed for a three-year period.
“But purely through the good graces of TOCA, along with all competing BTCC teams and engine builders agreeing to it, they were given a waiver and the unique opportunity of correcting their performance issue. Since fitting this new manifold and camshaft their performances have been nothing short of extraordinary; achieving three out of four pole positions, winning four races, achieving 15 podiums and setting three fastest laps.
“So for Jason to still complain and infer that they have not been given the “right level of performance” is simply bizarre. It’s actually borderline offensive – not only to TOCA, but to all other BTCC teams and engine builders who all agreed to assist them. Had it not been for this unique cooperation and agreement, their car would have remained far less competitive than it now is.
“With their current level of success I would have thought Jason would be thanking TOCA, the teams and the engine builders… but sadly not and he has prodded this subject too often for me to just sit back and not respond. However, I will be interested to hear if the thoughts of Team BMR Subaru also reflect those of Jason’s…”