Tough Weekend For Morgan At Croft

Reading based racer Alex Morgan was back in action at Croft this weekend in the UK Clio Cup Championship. After a spate of bad luck over the past few races with continuous technical issues with his car and racing incidents, Morgan was keen to get his 2014 championship title bid back on track. After finishing 5^th and 7^th in the latest rounds this weekend at the North Yorkshire circuit, everything is still to play for with eight races to go, and Alex lies 5th in the Championship Standings. After heading into the weekend fourth in the championship, behind Josh Cook, James Colburn and Mike Bushell, Alex qualified his SV Racing KX car in 10th for race 1, setting a lap nine tenths off the pole time in an extremely competitive Clio Cup qualifying session. His second fastest lap secured him a fourth row spot from eighth for race two. From 10^th on the grid in Sunday’s first race, Alex made a brilliant start to claim five places on lap 1. The race was intense as a battle started with Bushell initially and then with KX Akademy teammates Ant Whorton-Eales and Josh Cook in the closing stages. Alex crossd the line in 5^th at the drop of the flag to score more important championship points. In race 2, Morgan had the same agenda but after making an evasive manoeuvre to avoid a tyre bail and  being hit at the hairpin by teammate Ash Hand, Morgan had his work cut out but managed to reclaim 7^th place at the end of the 25 minute race. Morgan said:

The weekend has been positive in a number of ways, our improved race pace was good and if qualifying had gone my way I think I could have had two very good results. I was disappointed to be in the wrong place at the wrong time in race 2 but I showed grit and determination to come back to salvage 7^th place. There is a lot to work on however  the qualifying  pace wasn’t good enough and so I will be working on this with the team during the break we now have before Snetterton where rounds 11 and 12 will take place. The car is still lacking race pace and whilst we had more pace at Croft compare to Oulton and Donington we are still down 4/5 tenths a  lap which the team are trying to address. I am a bit further behind the Championship lead than I would like to be at this stage but Clio racing in the past only goes to show that it’s not over until the flag drops at the last race. I’m keen to get back to the front of the grid and look forward to getting out on track again soon.

The next two races take place at Snetteron on 1-3 August.