2020 draws to a close at Brands Hatch.
This weekend saw Brands Hatch host the finale to what has been a very unpredictable and unusual British Touring Car Championship season, and plenty of learnings have been discovered.
At a championship level, Ash Sutton did enough on Sunday to claim his second career BTCC title. At the same time, Power Maxed Racing continued with their guest driver program, with Brad Philpot in the hot seat of the PMR Astra over the weekend.
During the three races, Brad's performance reflected the season as a whole for PMR, delivering a very creditable performance in very tough circumstances. For everyone, this season has been like no other, but there are plenty of positives that can be drawn from the unique experience of 2020.
Challenges have come thick and fast and have ranged from illness, lack of track time for new drivers, weather, on-track collisions, red flags and even a massive crash. These would have stopped many teams, but the drivers and crew of PMR's resilience is a credit to how a team can work together to overcome unprecedented circumstances. This is something that will be drawn upon over the coming months as plans are already starting for next year's season.
There wasn't even time for the season to get underway back in March. It was impacted from the outset with the pandemic forcing an initial postponement and then re-scheduling into a compacted calendar. The new schedule also reduced rounds from ten to nine, adding further pressure onto teams with fewer performance measurement opportunities. This is the type of shift in arrangements we have all had to face during the last eight months and the positive thing is that we all have adapted for the most part. In the business world, we've managed to move meetings, shorten the buying process, change the way we do things to make business happen. All part of adapting our mindsets to what "normal" now is.
In the BTCC the shorter period between race weekends forced teams to look at processes to become more efficient, saving time being of the essence to keep cars race-ready. This adaptability is a massive lesson learned and the shift in thinking from "we can't do that" to "we have to do that to continue" has created many new ways of meeting the needs of a racing team. An example of our own here at sales-i would be the format of our internal meetings, from "Town Halls" in meeting rooms to Zoom meetings with over 60 participants. Something we've never done before, but the necessity of communication with our co-workers led us to that solution.
BTCC organizers have already confirmed next season's calendar. The first race weekend will be at Brands Hatch in April and we can't wait to be there to support PMR as they build on this year's performance. One thing that is certain is that unpredictability will be here for some time, both on and off the track, and insights discovered over the past few months will be valuable in supporting decision-making in 2021. Having the tools to monitor and measure performance, whether that be a race-ready Vauxhall Astra or in day-to-day business, has never been more critical.
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