Rob Huff ‘was in a great zone’ on way to ‘special’ win

Rob Huff delighted in claiming his first British Touring Car Championship victory in 20 years in the final race at Snetterton, praising his Toyota Corolla after coming from the seventh row of the grid to win.

Although Huff won in the reversed grid race, he had to do so without having the benefit of the grid reversal, after finishing race two in 14^th place.

Making up eight places over the first two laps, the Toyota ace found himself in a four-car Speedworks Motorsport battle, whilst early race leader Jake Hill pulled clear on a wet-but-drying circuit.

With Huff having the benefit of the soft compound slick tyre, he excelled in the drying conditions, and after several laps battling with his stable-mates in the satellite Speedworks squad, he was in second at the two thirds distance.

The 44-year-old then swiftly despatched struggling race leader Hill and went on to claim his third outright BTCC victory, and his first in the championship since he last won, also at the Norfolk venue, in 2004.

“This weekend the car has been fantastic, from the base setup we decided to bring here to the changes we’ve made,” said Huff to TouringCars.Net.

“But we didn’t really get to exploit that with the wet conditions in race one and then the hard tyres in race two before it rained again.

“Race three was the first opportunity I got to really exploit what the car had, and it was absolutely phenomenal – it’s one of the best cars I’ve ever driven. Wherever I put it, it went.

“It never did me wrong, it never bit me, it just went wherever I pointed it and I could just go on the throttle and it kept turning. To have a car like that is what you dream of.”

Huff admitted that despite leading the race for the final four laps, he didn’t know it at the time as he was so focussed on his driving.

“I had no idea where anyone was! When you start fifth or sixth you know where people are, but when you start in 14^th I literally had no clue where anyone was.

“Turn one was like Days of Thunder with [Mikey] Doble smoking out everyone and people trying to go flat but then braking.

“After that, I had no idea where anyone was or where the front was. You don’t know if you’ve got phenomenal pace or everyone else has and they’ve already cleared off.

“It was the first time in my life that I genuinely didn’t know where I was and I didn’t want to ask my engineer because then I didn’t want to make a mistake. I was in a great zone, in a great place, and just kept going and going.”

Living local to the circuit in Cambridge, Huff said it had been a special weekend for him.

“To do it here is very special, and to do it in the third race of the day is very special. I’ve got great support from my home crowd, which is very special. I’m very lucky and blessed in motorsport that I have a really great following of fans.

“To be able to do that on my ninth BTCC race return, when at Donington we didn’t get to qualify, at Brands Hatch we got black-and-orange flagged, but here things went relatively smooth from a technical side, is pretty special.”