Puncture prevents Buckingham's Swatton achieving his first triple top ten finish

Matthew Swatton was on for his first triple top ten finish in the Junior Saloon Car Championship at Thruxton, when a puncture in his final race quashed the Buckingham teenager's hopes.

Thruxton was another new track for the Cursley Motorsport driver to get to grips with, particularly as it has the title of the UK's fastest circuit!

Despite only forty-five minutes of practice time through the Friday, Swatton managed a very respectable Saturday qualifying position of P10, P8 & P8 (out of a grid of 17) for the weekend's three races.

Saturday afternoon's race was an excellent closely fought affair with the infamous Thruxton slipstream seeing the midfield pack swap positions many times throughout the fifteen minute race duration. Swatton ultimately finishing P8, his best result to date.

Swatton negotiates the Club Chicane at Thruxton circuit. Pic: Jasmine Marles.

Sunday morning's race had to be re-started after an on-track incident. Following the re-start, running on older tyres than some of his competitors, he managed to hang on to bring home P9.

On fresh front tyres for the afternoon race, he was running in P7, when a puncture on one of the new tyres forced him to limp back to the pits. With the wheel changed, he got back out on track to complete the race, but was, by then, running well over a lap down in P14.

'We so wanted three top ten finishes this weekend', said a frustrated Swatton afterwards, 'I was gutted to get the puncture but these things happen and the team got me back out so we could finish the race for a few more championship points'.

Swatton's weekend points haul moves him to joint tenth in the overall championship and fourth in the rookies. His next race is at Silverstone on the National circuit on 17-18 May. Keep up to date with all his latest news at www.swattonracing.com