Rotek Racing Press Release
Robb ‘Hollywood’ Holland and his Rotek Racing team are hoping for a seismic shift in fortunes as the 2014 Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship (BTCC) bursts back into life on the Snetterton ‘300’ circuit (2-3 August).
A lack of pre-season testing led to a tumultuous and troubled beginning to Rotek Racing’s BTCC foray, but this only served to heighten the Nürburgring and Silverstone-based team’s desire to overcome its new-car teething problems and the opposition.
A determined effort to fettle and refine the striking Audi S3 saloon over the six-week mid-season break culminated with a highly productive test at Pembrey in Wales, where Rotek Racing clarified the source of its problems and embarked down a road that it hopes will yield results in the concluding half of the 2014 season.
Snetterton has the honour of hosting Rounds 16, 17 and 18 of the Dunlop-backed BTCC and its 2.99mile ‘300’ configuration is one Holland is extremely familiar with, having made his BTCC bow at the East Anglian venue in 2012.
Situated in the Norfolk countryside, Snetterton, which has been on the BTCC package for over 50 years, encompasses a number of flat out straights and a tight, technical infield section that draws inspiration from some of motorsport’s most iconic corners, such as Monza’s Parabolica and Montréal’s Circuit Gilles-Villeneuve Hairpin.
Heading to Snetterton having clocked up countless testing miles and with prior knowledge and experience of the circuit gives Holland cause for optimism, although the Oakley Motorsports-backed American remains cautious about Rotek Racing’s prospects.
“It’s a great feeling knowing that we have finally clocked up some testing miles at Pembrey last week and to have spent some time on the shake rig and I’ll be interested to see how it all shapes up at Snetterton,” said Holland. “I’m cautiously optimistic that we have made some gains based on my feel in the car and the fact we picked up a bunch of time over the course of the test with some simple, yet fundamental alterations.
“We have a much better understanding of how the car works and a direction to go in for the rest of the season, but we can only hope that Snetterton will be a turning point for the team. This is the first track I’ve competed on before and that prior knowledge and experience, plus the gains made in testing should result in an improvement. I don’t have any specific targets because we haven’t had anybody to compare ourselves to and I’ve been in the business long enough to know that, no matter how much you want it to, things don’t always correlate or translate from one circuit to another.”
Qualifying for Round 16 of the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship (BTCC) takes place at 15.20 on Saturday (2 August) and will be streamed live on thewww.itv.com/btcc web page.
This precedes Round 16 itself at 12.02, Round 17 at 14.35 and Round 18 at 16.57 on Sunday (3 August), all of which will be beamed live and in high definition on ITV4 and ITV4HD.
For more on Rotek Racing, visit the official www.rotekracing.com website, ‘like’ the team’s Facebook page or follow @rotekracing on Twitter.
Photo credit:BTCC