NORTH Hampshire British Touring Car Championship drivers Rob Collard and Nick Foster found their home circuit of Thruxton a wild and unforgiving place last Sunday.

Heavy rain fell on the fastest track of the championships, making racing very difficult, with standing water at various places around the circuit.

Hook’s Collard enjoyed the best results of the two home drivers, with three top 10 finishes. He qualified sixth on Saturday’s and after an incident up front, which saw pole man Andrew Jordan spin off, he moved up to fourth at the end of the first lap.

Collard moved up to third for three laps before Jason Plato took away the podium spot as the race entered its final four laps.

Liam Griffin then put his tyre on the grass on the home straight, sending him into the tyre wall. When the recovery truck then got bogged down in the grass trying to pull the car to safety, the race was red flagged with Collard having to settle for fourth spot.

Race two of the day was started behind the safety car as conditions remained just as bad and the West Surrey team struggled with tyre wear on the demanding track, meaning their grip levels were not great, but Collard battled on to finish seventh.

The reverse grid moved the Hook driver up to third on the grid and with the track drying he decided to go with a dry set-up.

However, the rain returned as the cars headed to the grid and he had a massive slide on the opening lap, dropping him down the field.

Then at the chicane on the final lap he was spun right round by Lea Wood but managed to make it over the line before his left rear tyre gave out.

The results left him fifth in the overall championship and third in the independent drivers standings, only four points behind leader Mat Jackson.

Collard said: “It was another frustrating weekend. We have the pace early on in the races but we haven’t mastered the tyres yet and I also suffered from oversteer in the three races.

“We went for a dry set-up for race three but then the rain returned so it was a case of hanging on and I was disappointed at Wood’s kamikaze move into the final corner as it could have caused a big accident.”

Odiham Foster’s was expecting a tough weekend and that is what it proved to be, but he did pick up championship points in all three races as finished 14th, 14th and 11th. Having qualified 11th, his first race on Sunday proved the most eventful, especially when his wipers stopped working. He was then hit by Gordon Shedden, which cost him a number of places.

Foster said: “It was really difficult track conditions as one lap it was really wet, but you’d have some grip then next time around it was really greasy and the car would aquaplane.

“In the opening race my wipers just stopped so I was almost driving blind. The car also started to mist up and then I was tipped into a half spin by Gordon Shedden, so it was a bit action-packed.

He added: “In all three races we did have one other problem to deal with, which was tyre wear. We would be really strong for the first six or seven laps but then the performance would start to drop off.

“We can still take some positives from the weekend as I scored points in all three races and came away from the weekend with an undamaged car.”

Both drivers will now hope the weather improves before the next rounds in the championship, which are at Oulton Park on June 10.