Three Winners In Three Races as Donington Delivers! - RTA BTCC Round 2 Review

By Evan Dalton for RTA Virtual Motorsport


Photo Evan Walsh


Dan Mould, Oscar Mangan and Ronan Doherty took a heat win each in three dazzling Donington races at round two of the Motorsport.ie RTA British Touring Car Championship. 


Mould returned to RTA Virtual Motorsport and his skills were not past their sell by date, as he took pole position for the evenings action. With Mangan alongside him on the front row, it was bound to be an entertaining event. 


HEAT 1 

Mould got off the line well, and much better than Mangan, who was overtaken by Doherty on the run down to the ‘Old Hairpin.’ It was a move that unleashed Doherty to try and attack the race leader. 


The opening lap fighting mostly took place in the midfield, with cars going side by side through every corner, every lap and every minute until the chequered flag. Dylan McClements and Keith Stewart, Danny Dempsey and Dave Collier, Robbie Callaghan and Brandon McCaughan. Fighting was found all over the grid in the short ten minutes.


On the last lap, with Mould set for gold, Doherty and Mangan fought for silver. Mangan dove down the inside of Doherty into the ‘Melbourne Hairpin,’ but could not find a way through. He had to settle for second. 


HEAT 2 

It was a prime opportunity for Doherty to attack Mould, given how good his race starts have been in his Audi RS3 LMS. He got through the initial start phase better than Mould, and pulled alongside. When trying to push Mould towards the apex, he misjudged his manoeuvre and collected both himself and Mould and headed for the wall. All before turn one.


It was a dreadful error in a race of opportunity for Doherty. He later apologised to Mould in an interview with GantryTV, but the chance of victory in Heat 2 had gone. 


The seas had parted for Mangan. He had just over two and a half miles of pristine, clean asphalt in front of him to drive into with nobody to stop him, and nobody did. Mangan had claimed the easiest 30 points of RTA career to date. 


The rest of the field did not have it as easy. Conor Melia, who got off the line well, spun around on the opening lap after contact with Brandon McCaughan and Shaun McGoldrick. Simon Hutchings and Phil Upson also made contact, with debris flying all over the circuit. 


Jordan Kelly drove home to a consistent second place finish and Dylan McClements survived late race pressure from Evan Walsh and Robbie Callaghan to take his first podium of the season. 


Crucially, after a disastrous start to the race, Doherty finished in eight place. This gave him pole position for the ‘reverse top eight’ feature race. 


HEAT 3

Doherty nailed his race start once again, and this time successfully navigated turn one. The same couldn’t be said for others. McGoldrick missed timed his braking and hit the rear of Emma Dempsey’s Hyundai and sent her flying across the grass of turn one. A helpless Dempsey smashed into the side of an unaware Melia, Collier and Jamal Ghandour. 


Kelly, Mould and Mangan all got fast starts, and it was Kelly who first got up to second place in hopes of hunting down Doherty. It was not without a fight however, as the reigning RTA Donington Feature Race winner McCaughan attempted to defend his place. 


Mould made light weight work of Walsh with a sneaky move down the inside, but he was the only one who made it look easy. ‘The Walsh Train’ returned, and Callaghan, Mangan, Stewart and McClements all had first class tickets. The train was derailed by Stewart however, as he hit Walsh late in the race while trying to overtake. 


As much as Kelly and Mould tried, they could not catch the boy from Dunloy. A second win in the same number of weeks continues Doherty’s impressive start to the season. 


Mangan’s consistency sees him lead the championship ahead of RTA’s trip to Snetterton next Tuesday night, which can be viewed from 9pm on GantryTV.  

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