James Pickford, 26, out qualified both his team mates to deliver his best BTCC performance to date at Silverstone Circuit this weekend. The Macclesfield driver topped the time sheets in the first free practice session, qualified 4th and equalled his best BTCC result by taking 2nd place in Round 25.

Of his fine qualifying performance, James’ said: "I've had a good car all day as I was able to set fastest time in the first free practice session. That was fantastic as it's the first time I've ever topped a practice session and it gave me a lot of confidence for qualifying. At the start of qualifying I was eleventh and I thought to myself 'what's going on' as I was doing everything that I'd done in the morning but the time wasn't there. Then we put a new set of tyres on and everything seemed to come together and work well, the balance of the car was good and I moved up to third instantly. From then on I was hoping and praying that not many people would go faster than me and as it happened only one person managed to go quicker. From then on I couldn't seem to better my fastest lap, I could get close to it by getting a few tenths up on the first part of the lap but then I'd lose a tenth or two on last few corners. I'm absolutely chuffed to bits to be the lead SEAT and that's set me up really well for the rest of the weekend."

Having finished 2nd in Round 25, the first race of the day, a rev limiter problem saw him lose position at the start of Round 26 and he was then accidentally tapped into the gravel by Luke, but James managed to recover and finish 7th giving him a 3rd place grid slot for the final race of the day. Round 27 saw James involved in a four car battle with Dan Eaves, Yvan Muller and Jason. Finding that the balance of his Toledo Cupra wasn't quite as good as it had previously been he struggled to find the pace he needed and gradually dropped back to finish in 8th position.

James said : "It's been a really good weekend. I started it by topping the times in the first free practice session which is the first time I've ever done that. Then I had my best BTCC qualifying session of the year to secure fourth. The car was magnificent in the first race, the best it's been all year, and I was able to battle through to second. I even overtook Yvan Muller cleanly and it felt really good. It's nice to pick another bit of silverware up and be up on the podium with Jason. It's also very nice to beat Jason - I'm not going to hide that. The second race was difficult; I had a lot of weight on board which made the car very hard to drive. I dropped back through the field and then Luke accidentally tapped me off into the gravel. It was just one of those things and I decided to drop back and go for a better grid position in the final race. In the third race the balance of the car had gone and it was just like driving a rally car. It was seriously hard work and it really took it out of me as I was constantly correcting the car. I've shown this weekend that when the car's right I can do the business and I don't think anyone can doubt that."
2005 BTCC points (after Round 27)

Drivers
1. Matt Neal….291pts
2. Yvan Muller….261pts
3. Dan Eaves….238pts
4. Jason Plato….182pts
5. Tom Chilton….175pts
6. Colin Turkington….165pts
7. Rob Collard….154pts
8. James Pickford….97pts
9. Luke Hines….83pts
10. Gavin Smith….63pts
11. James Kaye….46pts

Manufacturers
1. Vauxhall….708pts
2. SEAT….583pts

Teams
1. Team Halfords….534pts
2. VX Racing….428pts
3. SEAT Sport UK….279pts
4. Arena Motorsports….157pts
5. WSR….154pts

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