Two-time British Touring Car champion Jason Plato emerged from qualifying 'pretty happy' aꦉfter setting the seventh fastest time in the 30-minute shootout at Thruxton.

Plato looked in good form as soon as the cars hit track for FP1, where the 97-time BTCC race winner set the second fastest time behind his Rich Energy ൩BTC Racing team mate Jo♛sh Cook.

Having produced two solid qualifying runs, Plato provisionally sat on the second row of the grid with 10-minutes to go, but felt more time was left on the tab🌳le after a lap deletion, co🦩upled with a small error on his fastest lap.

Plato elected to remain in the garage to save tyres for race day after com♊pleting his second run.

"The lap which was disallowed was slightly quicker but it should’ve been 𒅌another 0.150s better so I should’ve done a high 1’15.4. I just a made little error on my lap," Plato told wuqian0821.com.

"I don’t know why it was deleted, but it was, so I would’ve been a high 4. We elected to 𒁃do two runs ♛in qualifying with four new tyres. At the end of that run, we were sat P4.

"The fastest time out there was a 15.4 and I think I could’ve done a 15.4ဣ. But I had✅ no more tyres left. 

"We decided to call it a day because the only other option was to put 2 new front tyres on which normally upsets t♔ဣhe balance, but sometimes you feel you can get a lap out of it. We didn’t do that.

"Josh [Cook𒐪], Cammish and a couple of others put new fronts on and went quicker. That’s no excuse, it just wasn’t in our plan."

Nevert💙heless, Plato is confident he'll reap the rewards of sacrificing another run in qualifying by having a better tyre allocation for Sunday's th😼ree races.

The BTCC legend believes he's got the pace 𝔍to be a part of the leadinꦛg group come race day.

"We’ve got lots of good tyres and we’re not compromised at all for any of the races on tyres. We’ve got🔴 a better tyre selection than Josh and that was our plan," Plato continued.

"I’m pretty happy. If you look at the times, there’s seven guys and then there’s a jump to the rest. I think we’re in the race. Let’s wait and seღe what happens tomorrow."