Dan Cammish:
We definitely turned a corner this weekend. I think we’ve had a fundamental handling issue that we’ve struggled to figure out on my car. This weekend, we spent a lot of time in FP1 just purely working through it. ‘Asking what do we need? What do we need to change? Let’s work at that. Don’t worry about the qualifying.’ We looked far more competitive in race-trim in race one than we have all season.
“The speed difference when you’re on your own, compared to when you’re in traffic, is night and day. Unfortunately, my day was kind of done from race two. I don’t think we deserved it and we’ve had a lot of bad luck. To be a passenger in an accident not of your own doing is a shame. Ash has won and I should have been on the podium supporting him, talking points off other people and helping the team. It’s not because we’re not doing a good job, we were the fastest qualifier and we led every session for the team. We finished higher in race one, and then it goes from there.
“I just got knocked off in race two. I didn’t make turn two basically. [Dan] Lloyd hit [Ricky] Collard, who’s hit [Dan] Rowbottom into the back of me, who’s really finished me off, and I’ve sort of speared into the side of Ash and broken the car. So, I went from seventh to near last, and then back to 18th, but my day was kind of done at that point.
“Unfortunately, with the heat soak in the engines and things it’s so hard to come forward, as the engines are absolutely screaming. I made an alright start in the last race; I got up to 15th and then we had a bit of an engine splutter. I thought I was having engine failure down the back straight, we didn’t even get to sixth gear, it just stopped in fifth and wouldn’t pull and I thought the engine was failing. It’s very, very hot at that point, but we got onto the finish line straight and it cleared. I think it sucked some dust or something up and the engine coughed and that’s when Gordon [Shedden] just drove past me. Then I felt it clear, thought I’d continue, and I just drove straight back up to them.
“It was by far and away our best showing, it’s just to shame that it didn’t really come to anything when actually it could have culminated in a really nice end.”
Dan Cammish left Snetterton optimistic for the remainder of the British Touring Car Championship season as he unlocked race pace with his NAPA Racing UK Ford Focus ST, despite not having a strong finish to his weekend.
Battling a handling issue throughout the season, he and the team at Motorbase Performance have managed to get on top of the problem, allowing them to spend time in free practice working on race pace ahead of what would be an extremely hot couple of days.
Qualifying eighth in a good session on Saturday afternoon, Dan had a clean start to the opening 12-lap race on Sunday, though had to stay firm as Tom Chilton drew alongside into turn one. After that he ran in a long train of cars as he both tried to find a way past Dan Rowbottom while also defending from Ricky Collard behind.
Getting a good run through the Bomb Hole at the end of lap three he made a good move to gain seventh before the Safety Car was called. When the race restarted, he was stuck behind Jason Plato as the leading five cars pulled away and wasn’t able to get another spot by the end of the race.
The Yorkshireman had a difficult start to race two as a pinball effect behind meant cars bounced into each other which culminated in Dan being pushed into team-mate Ash Sutton and suffering damage to his car. Making his way forwards after falling to 21st, he climbed to 18th before a brief Safety Car period but was unable to make any further progress.
Lining up in 18th position for the final contest, Dan had a busy 12 laps but was battling an intermittent power issue throughout which would cost him time then clear, allowing him to catch back up to those ahead. Unfortunately, after making it into the points in 15th, a drop off of power on the Bentley Straight allowed Gordon Shedden to get ahead.
Dan will be looking to take these positive steps to Thruxton as the NAPA Racing UK racer will be back in BTCC action in Hampshire, over the weekend of August 27/28, for the 22nd, 23rd, and 24th rounds of the season.
