SWINDON’S DUO Motorsport with HMS Racing team are hoping to put a mixed couple of rounds behind them as Oulton Park Island Circuit hosts the fourth event in the 2018 Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship campaign this weekend.

Since reaching the podium in the third round of the championship on the opening weekend of the campaign at Brands Hatch, Alfa Romeo Giulietta driver Rob Austin has been unable to replicate those heroics at Donington Park or Thruxton.

But development of the team’s car has continued and Austin believes they are back on track as they head to Cheshire.

“After a respectable start to the season we lost our way with the set-up of the car, but we feel very confident we are back on track now and we know if we can get the DUO Motorsport with HMS Alfa Romeo working then we will be challenging for podiums and wins”, said a confident Austin.

“My race engineer Matt and I have put in days of hard work trawling through every bit of data we have gathered so far this season, and we really feel we have isolated where we have been going wrong.

“It won’t be an instant fix, but if we are correct and manage to dial the car in quickly then we will be on for a strong weekend at Oulton.”

He added: “It’s a great circuit, one of the best.

“It’s where I won my first ever car race 21 years ago and I’ve also visited the BTCC podium at Oulton so it holds fond memories for me as well as being a fantastic circuit to drive – I can’t wait to get going.”

Opening practice was getting under way at 9.30amtoday, with session two following at 12.10 and qualifying, streamed live online at the itv.com/btcc website, beginning at 3.20pm.

Tomorrow, round 10 of the season will begin the day’s track action at 12.20pm with round 11 following at 2.50pm and round 12 scheduled to begin at 5.05pm.

All three encounters will be screened live on ITV4.