12th April 2008

JHR Developments driver Andrew Herron fought back superbly well from opening lap difficulties at Rockingham International Sports Car Circuit this afternoon, Saturday, 12th April, to carve out a well deserved top five result; moving the Northern Irishman up to ninth position in the SEAT Cupra Championship standings.

The Brian Herron Contracts supported star recorded the sixth fastest time in qualifying with a lap if 1m 26.447 seconds (80.78mph) but at the start of today’s third round, Andrew was pushed back down the order as the cars headed off the grid, through the banked Turn One and into Deene Hairpin for the first time.

Running in ninth place, Andrew quickly set about staying in touch with the cars ahead as he moved up into the top eight. For several laps he was locked in a very entertaining duel with Jamie Ackers and out of Deene on lap eight, Andrew got alongside but wasn’t quite able to make the move stick and he repeated the attempt during the next lap.

However, on lap 10 at the same corner, the Dromore-based racer’s pressure paid off as he slipped inside Ackers’ SEAT and into the top seven. Closing on the squabbling cars of Jeremy Gumbley and Daniel Welch, 19-year-old Andrew sensed a serious opportunity to make up more places.

On lap 13 at Yentwood, he seized his chance to move ahead of Gumbley and after defending the position well at Deene on the following tour Andrew edged ever closer to the tail of fifth-placed Welch.

Running side-by-side at Yentwood on the penultimate lap, Andrew couldn’t quite get ahead but an absolutely stunning move out of Pif-Paf and onto Steel Straight saw him slice past Welch and into the top five where he would remain to the chequered flag.

Commenting on the first of the weekend’s races, Andrew said: “After losing places at the start, I sat behind Ackers as I could see he was pushing his tyres hard so I thought I’d let him do the work. When I started to pressurise him more, he made a small mistake and my tyres were still good so I pushed and caught Gumbley and Welch real fast.

“After sitting behind them for a couple of laps, they started to fall over each other and when I got past them I was pretty happy to get the points for fifth place. It’s nice when you’re catching people and you can see you’re faster than them. It was a shame about the start but overall I did enjoy the race.”

Round four of the 2008 SEAT Cupra Championship is timetabled to start at 12.00 tomorrow, Sunday, 13th April. Andrew will start the race from ninth on the grid.