Oulton Park was the scene for Ross Curnow to have a shakedown drive in the Formula Renault BARC Championship on 26 May. Now heading up Double M Racing’s Formula Renault programme, it was an opportunity for Ross to get behind the wheel to see for himself how competitive their set up is.

Having never raced the car before, Ross qualified 9^th out of 29 in spite of struggling with a slipping clutch. ‘We were 2/10ths off qualifying second and the data showed that the clutch was losing us 4/10ths on the straight so this was a good start for us,’ said Ross afterwards.

In the race, Ross fought his way up to 4^th by the time the pack had reached Cascades and held that position until the race was red flagged on the next lap. The restart was based on the original grid so he had it all to do again, pushing through to 5^th before the red flag appeared for a second time. After the second restart, he held onto 5^th for two laps before his race was ended by the car in 3^rd place going off at Cascades and coming back onto the track to collect him.

Ross said: ‘It’s obviously been a frustrating weekend for us, but we’ve proved we have a good set up and gained some valuable data. In spite of the incident packed race, it was also good to get into the seat again – I enjoyed it.’

The team was encouraged by Ross’s performance in the car and are considering the possibility of another drive for him at the Snetterton round on 9^th August.