2024 BTCC Round One - Donington

[Mike Harte]

To those who, earlier, were saying what a farce the day had been so far, might I humbly suggest that if you have never raced on a really wet circuit, let alone one that had multiple streams going across it, then your comments were truly unfair. I've raced at Brands Indy in the pouring rain twice in a car that a) wasn't a s fast as these BTCC cars are and b) one that was only worth a mere fraction of today's cars, and it can be quite frightening because a driver never knows when he could aquaplaning or just plain going straight on rather than going around a corner.

It may look exciting to watch, but for a driver that's got his head screwed on properly, it is far from fun. I think that the organisers and most of the drivers interviewed got it absolutely right, but it was obviously unfortunate for those sitting on the banks today. However, their perseverance paid off in the end because we all ended up seeing some cracking races and racing through the afternoon.

On another matter, it was quite uncomfortable at times watching some drivers in various races leaving the track, obviously unintentionally, but then returning to the circuit in what I would consider an unsafe manner. That no-one else was actually collected by these drivers was a minor miracle, and I hope that this will be pointed out to the drivers when they have their briefing at Brands in a couple of weeks.