LOTUS ELISE CHAMPIONSHIP

TURNER RETIRES WHILE CHALLENGING
FOR TOP FIVE POSITION

American Lotus charger Matt Turner was fortunate to escape injury after a monster crash at Snetterton during the one-off night race on Saturday night.

The Corus Hotels backed driver looked odds-on to repeat his pole position of a fortnight earlier when the cars took to the track for the opening practice session of the weekend, but a suspension failure meant he was unable to challenge and he was left languishing in ninth place.

At the start of the race Turner maintained station as the cars jostled for position into the opening corner. He climbed up a place on the opening lap and made another move on lap two to take seventh, and was then promoted to sixth when a rival dropped out. With the leading group pulling well clear of the rest of the field, he was looking to challenge for a top five position when the safety car was deployed because of an accident further back down the field. The cars were forced to line up and crawl around behind the safety car for three laps while the cars were cleared away.

As racing resumed, Turner was right on the tail of the leading group looking to make a move when his car suddenly snapped around. "I just put a wheel on the grass and the car was gone," he said. The car spun across the circuit and careered into the barriers on the outside of the track, launching up in the air and landing on top of the tyres. Some debris went into the crowd and racing was halted while the track was restored to a safe condition.

"I got straight out of the car and headed for the crowd to make sure everybody was OK," said Matt. "It shows the force of the accident that it managed to create so much debris. I am glad everybody is fine." Fortunately, only one person suffered a minor injury.

"It is not a good way to end a race when it was looking so promising," said Turner. "I have now got to look ahead to the next race where I can hopefully put things back on track. This was not one of the weekend's to remember and I want to look ahead."