BTC Norlin Racing’s Dan Lloyd was pleased with eighth in the opening British Touring Car Championship race at Croft – his best showing since returning to the category.
The TCR UK points leader rejoined the BTCC at Oulton Park a fortnight ago, but as per regulations was forced to run with 45 kilograms of ballast on board his Honda Civic Type R as a late entry.
With that now removed for the triple-header around the 2.1 mile Yorkshire circuit, Croft represents Lloyd’s first chance to race like-for-like with his closest rivals.
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He was also satisfied to finish the dramatic race as the highest-placed Honda.
“I made a big improvement with the car this weekend which is why we found the pace in qualifying yesterday,” explained Lloyd to TouringCars.net
“We’re the top Honda, which is great. In the first race I’m really happy with the result – I managed to keep out of trouble. There was a lot of damage at Oulton and the boys were still repairing the car at 1 am on Saturday morning, so to bring it home in one piece and in the top ten makes it a bit of a result for them – it’s really good.”
Fighting at the sharp end feels even better for the former Eurotech and MG racer, given his lack of testing time in the car.
“Yesterday was only my third day in the car – I’ve done no testing, not even a shakedown before these rounds, and we’re making large setup changes to the car to suit me as well along the way,” he explained.
“It’s good to be up there. I feel that the others have an edge on us at the minute so I’m happy to keep that sort of result in race one.”
Lloyd pointed out the difference the weight made at Oulton Park in hampering his progress, but equally feels the car will perform well in race two even after having success ballast applied.
“A big difference – I think we couldn’t have gone to a worse circuit with the weight as well. At Oulton we were struggling with the brakes a lot and there were a lot of bad things happening at once as well as the weight, so it was bad timing,” he said.
“I think we’ll be alright. Some of the other cars are carrying the weight very well – Ingram is very, very quick with that sort of weight in. So I’m hoping it won’t make a big difference.”
The second race gets underway at 14:45 BST.
