Champagne celebration for Cook at Brands Hatch but Moffat misses out

• Mixed fortunes for LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ duo in Kent

• Cook charges to hard-fought podium following crowd-pleasing duel

• Team-mate Moffat on-track for similar result until misfortune strikes

Josh Cook charged to a popular podium finish for LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ in the second outing of the 2024 British Touring Car Championship campaign at Brands Hatch last weekend (11-12 May), as the team’s strong start to its maiden season in the UK’s premier motor racing series shows no signs of slowing down.
 
Between them, Cook and team-mate Aiden Moffat notched up just shy of 100 laps around Brands Hatch’s short ‘Indy’ layout during free practice, with the former proceeding to qualify an excellent fifth amongst the 20 high-calibre contenders – going quickest of anybody in Q2. 
 
Choosing to bolt the preferential soft-compound Goodyear ‘option’ tyres onto his British-built Toyota Corolla GR Sport for the curtain-raising contest, two-time BTCC Independents’ champion Cook went on the attack early on, spiritedly challenging Dan Cammish and Adam Morgan prior to chasing down Ash Sutton for second.
 
Trying every which way to prise the door open in an enthralling no-holds barred battle in front of the live ITV4 television cameras and capacity trackside crowd, Cook succeeded in making a move stick towards the end of lap 15, thereafter sprinting clear to cement his first rostrum appearance for the Speedworks Motorsport-run outfit.
 
The Bath-born ace fended off a fast-starting Jake Hill when the lights went out in race two, before contact with his BMW rival sent him squirming at Druids and demoted him to third. With Hill defending, Sutton was subsequently able to squeeze past Cook as well, but the Toyota driver was still running a very solid fourth when he was shown the mechanical warning flag with eight laps remaining, obliging him to pit for damaged bodywork to be repaired and dropping him outside of the points. The 32-year-old completed his weekend’s work with an 11th-place finish from 16th on the grid in race three.
 
In the sister car, Moffat – a winner on his LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ debut at Donington Park a fortnight earlier – struggled with balance issues in qualifying and missed out on advancing to Q2 by a scant three hundredths-of-a-second, restricting him to 15th on the grid for race one.
 
The 27-year-old Scot dug deep to convert that into a ninth-place finish as he grittily climbed the order, and he was once again in the thick of the action in race two on his way to eighth at the chequered flag.
 
That put Moffat fourth on the partially-reversed grid for the day’s finale – and with an ace up his sleeve, having saved his soft tyres until the end of the day. After hanging it boldly around the outside at the start to rise to third, the Dalkeith native settled into a three-way scrap for the runner-up spoils and was confident of making the position his own when a loss of power attributed to a turbo boost pipe issue cruelly forced him out at mid-distance.
 
Cook and Moffat will travel next to Snetterton on 25-26 May separated by just a single point in fifth and sixth in the Drivers’ standings, with LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ fourth in the Teams’ table.
 
Christian Dick, Team Principal, LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ, said:
 
“It was very much a weekend of mixed fortunes for Josh and Aiden at Brands Hatch. Given their respective qualifying positions, we adopted alternative approaches for them on Sunday, with Josh aiming to make hay early on while Aiden set his sights on the reversed-grid race. From a strategic point-of-view, I think that was spot-on, and it was only circumstances and bad luck that prevented us from coming away with even more silverware.
 
“Josh drove superbly to finish second in race one. Not many people get the better of Ash Sutton in a straight fight, but he stuck to his guns and his persistence was deservedly rewarded. He was on for a strong result on the medium rubber in race two as well until he had to pit to fix some damage caused by another driver, and then salvaged what he could from race three when half of the field was on the quicker soft tyres.
 
“Aiden was understandably disappointed after qualifying, but he is never one to lie down without a fight and he rolled up his sleeves to score some very solid points in races one and two. The plan was always for race three to be his redemption and he was driving beautifully when something completely out of his control robbed him of a podium finish. That was a real blow for the whole team, but at the end of the day, we win together and we lose together and we will regroup and come back punching at Snetterton.”
 
Josh Cook, Driver, LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ, said:
 
“Qualifying was tight, and with such small margins it could have gone either way. For some reason, we didn’t have the same level of grip in Q3 as in Q2, which meant we were lacking a bit of pace in the ‘Quick Six’, but it was a step in the right direction nonetheless and we knew we could do something from fifth. 
 
“Race one was the first time we’d put soft tyres on the car, so we were going into the unknown a little bit but the team did a great job with the set-up and the balance felt really good. Ash [Sutton] was never going to make it easy for me in the fight for second, so I had to get my elbows out! He was covering all the usual places, but we had good traction and I could see where my car was stronger. I tried to unsettle him at Graham Hill Bend, and eventually forced a small mistake at Clearways that allowed me to get my nose up the inside. 
 
“It was nice to secure my first podium finish for LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ – especially after such a tough battle – and the Corolla was competitive on the medium tyres in race two as well. I felt pretty comfortable inside the top four, so it was a real shame to have to pit due to damage not of our own making. From there, it was always going to be difficult to get much out of the last race with so many drivers on softs, but we did what we could and picked up a few points so now the focus turns to Snetterton.”
 
Aiden Moffat, Driver, LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ, said:
 
“The car felt good in practice, but we took a bit of a gamble in qualifying that led us the wrong way on set-up. Allied to our limited hybrid use as a result of our championship position, that left us down in 15th place, which was clearly frustrating, but we’re just scratching the surface with this car and have a lot to learn, and in that kind of situation, these things can happen.
 
“The team did a fantastic job with the changes they made overnight, and we approached Sunday as a completely new day. The Corolla felt like a different car to 24 hours earlier, and our strategy was to use the first two races on the medium tyres to build a solid foundation for the last one. I felt I had a pretty comfortable second place in the bag in race three, which would have lifted us up to fourth in the championship. I was saving tyres and hybrid to attack later on, and then we had the failure...
 
“That was obviously a hugely disappointing way to finish the weekend, but the real positive is that we know there’s good pace in this car – we’ve now proved that at two very different circuits in Donington Park and Brands Hatch – and it’s still early days for us in terms of exploring and exploiting the Toyota’s full potential, which is very exciting.”

Images: MJP Media (podium and action) / Jakob Ebrey Photography (autographs)