It’s been a winter of deep content for Jason Plato and his Subaru mechanics as they gear up for an assault on the BTCC title starting at Brands Hatch this weekend.
The newly-named Adrian Flux Subaru Racing team have spend the off season tweaking, tuning, and slimming the Levorg GT after a first season spent in a virtually perpetual state of testing.
And Plato, who last season clocked up BTCC win number 95 in his 500th race, says a tilt at the title was always the plan for Subaru’s second season of touring car racing.
“The guys have had a brilliant winter. Last year, effectively we didn’t have much chance to develop the car as we spent the whole season in race setup mode as once the season gets under way you’re in the middle of a fight with no real time to spend on exploratory testing,” he adds.
“You can’t really do any exploratory set up testing because a lot of those development changes you’d do before the season starts.
“We were looking forward to the end of last year and trying some radically different set ups. We’ve done that over the winter and found some really great things.
“The team has been on a weight loss programme – last year everything was made a bit stronger than it needed to be because we could not afford any problems with reliability.
“We’ve saved lots and lots of weight – we have to put that weight back into the car but now it means we can position the weight in a more advantageous place for weight distribution, balance etc.”
As well as the weight gains, our engine builders Mountune have found some extra power from the engine and our engineers have spent time on a simulator tailoring damper settings to each circuit.
All of which, when added to the Levorg’s roadholding advantage thanks to its low-slung flat-four engine (unique in the championship), gives Plato and his team a leading chance of leading the pack a merry dance in 2017.
“I’m very confident. The plan is to blow everybody’s doors off. We will without doubt have a brilliant chance of winning the championship this year,” says the twice touring car champion.
“The first year was all about development, the second year is about winning the thing. The car’s a lot quicker, and a lot lighter; we’ve moved the programme on considerably and we’re in brilliant shape. From a personal perspective, I am now totally at one with rear wheel drive after spending most of my career in front wheel drive machines.
“We will have the best package out there.”
The season gets under way round the Brands Hatch Indy circuit, with qualifying from 3.40pm on Saturday, April 1, and the first of three races starting at 11.30am the next day.
“Brands has been a very happy hunting ground for me in the past,” says Plato.
“The plan is to get on the front row and win some races. It’s a tough place to overtake so we’ll try to win it from the front.”
Coverage of the racing is live on ITV4.