PAUL MANNING HAPPY WITH TOP TEN RECOVERY

Paul Manning declared himself pleased with a top ten finish at Snetterton after a solid recovery through the field in the latest rounds of the Quaife MINI CHALLENGE Trophy.

The Mannpower Motorsport driver was left on the back foot after an incident in the opening race of the weekend saw him finish back in 24th place and with work to do in order to try and work his way up the order.

A grid penalty for race two didn’t help his cause, but Manning was able to overcome that to fight his way through to 14th spot, and he continued his forward progress to then take ninth spot in race three.

The 17 place gain across the weekend was the second highest seen this season and means Manning has now made up more places than any other driver in the Coopers over the five rounds run to far.

“Even though we’ve been here for four or five years, we’re still learning with the car and we made some big changes for the weekend,” he said. “We only had a few practice sessions on Friday because of the weather so qualifying was a step into the unknown, and the car felt good – although a bit too lively.

“We made changes for race one but then I had a spin that meant I was down the back for the start of race two, but we came through to 14th place in that one and then improved to P9 in race three which I think was a good job from where we started.”

Manning will now hope to make the most of the changes to the car in the remaining rounds for the Coopers at Donington Park and Brands Hatch.

“I’ve been round Donington a few times I know we have the pace if we can get the car set-up right,” he said. “We’ve struggled a bit at some of the circuits we have visited so far where you really need a tow and we are a single car team, but if we can get into the top ten in qualifying, we know we can stay there.

“I’ve also got to keep it on track, which I didn’t manage to do at Snetterton, but if I don’t make it too hard for myself, I’m sure we can add more top tens in the final rounds.”