Indy champion targets outright honours.
Having secured the Independents' title last season, Colin Turkington will hope to challenge for outright honours in the 2008 HiQ MSA British Touring Car Championship in what will be his second season at the wheel of the Team RAC BMW 320si.
The Northern Irishman was a multiple winner in his first year with the rear-wheel drive car in 2007 but admits that a lack of experience with the car worked against the WSR-run outfit on occasions - most notably in the first Thruxton round of the year when the team struggled with the harder compound Dunlop tyres.
However, the team now has a years-worth of experience with the car going into the new season and has completed a number of positive tests over the winter, the latest of which saw Turkington posted the second quickest time on Wednesday's media day at Rockingham.
"It's been going well," he reflected to Crash.net. "We are making a few steps forward from last year and are pleased with the results so far.
"Last year was a good season to get the Independents' title but there was a lot of highs and lows. To mount a challenge you need consistency and that is what we are working on to ensure we are fast at every track. Saying that, we did a good job last year with teh information we had as we were going to tracks with a 'best guess' set-up and sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't.
"We have a years worth of information now which is very useful so we can prepare much better."
Turkington admitted that the car has only undergone minor changes during the off-season, and said he was hopeful that both he and new team-mate Stephen Jelley will be on the pace from the opening round of the year at Brands Hatch later this month.
"It's very similar," he said. "It's the same car I raced last yyar but we have a few small updates. Obviously we will have a new engine and things like that, but no really big changes. It's a customer BMW at the end of the day and it hard to improve on what they have done.
"More time in the car is more confidence and I have a good understanding of the car now. As a team, we have a good idea of what direction to take in certain circumstances whereas last year we didn't, we had to get to a track and see how we got on.
"Sometimes free practice isn't long enough to prepare properly so we are in a better position this year and hopefully can challenge from the start."
Win tickets for Brands Hatch:
Crash.net is offering two lucky people the chance to win tickets to the BTCC season opener at Brands Hatch on 30 March. For more details and to enter, CLICK HERE.
