Mikey Doble played a strategic game on race day at Croft, running the hard tyre in race two which would decide the reverse grid race order, before securing the pole for the finale and converting it into a second win of the season.

Doble had been on the pace early in the weekend, qualifying his Power Maxed Racing Audi in third for Saturday afternoon’s qualifying race.

However, an electrical issue on the second lap stymied his race and after performing a reset, Doble could do little more than circulate to a 21st-place finish.

That left the 27-year-old to start from the 12th row of the grid for Sunday’s opening race, which took place in wet conditions after rain during the morning.

Doble had planned to run the hard tyre in the opening race, but with conditions favouring the use of wet rubber, Doble opted to run wets to make progress in the race and save his option tyre for race two.

That decision paid dividends when he was able to climb to an impressive ninth-place finish in the opening race, making up 12 places – more than any other driver.

His strategy was vindicated in race two when, forced to run the hard tyre as one of only four drivers in the field on the slower compound, Doble held on to drop just one place and finish in tenth.

That ultimately saw Doble randomly drawn to start race three from pole position, and he duly converted his pole into a second win of the season.

“We’ve been consistently fast all year and it’s nice to get that second win,” said Doble to TouringCars.Net. “I said I wanted to win a couple of races this year at least and we’re there now.

“A couple of issues over the last couple of meetings hasn’t been ideal. It affected us yesterday and put us on the back foot into race day, but we strategized well, raced well and earned our spot at the front of the grid for race three on the soft tyre.

“We thought we’d try and do something different to get that race three result. We took a bit of a gamble by nominating the hard [tyre] in race one, which then carried over to race two [after the race was declared wet].

“We were one of the few cars on the hard tyre in race two, which left us a bit vulnerable. But we managed to hold position, brought it home in tenth place, and ultimately that’s what won me the race in race three.

“Once I got off the line, had all the boost, was on the right tyre, had the pace in the car, I could just get my head down and then go and get that win.

Doble believes that taking a slightly riskier tyre strategy – he could have started the opening race on the hard tyre to get it out of the way and pitted to switch to wets at the end of the formation lap like eight other drivers – is the decision which paid dividends.

“We could have played it safe, we could have gone for the soft and probably had an average day, but we wanted to take a bit of a chance and get the win that we deserved and probably could have had a couple of meetings ago hadn’t it been for the issues.”

Having not only secured his second outright victory of the season but also eked out his advantage in the Independent drivers’ standings by a further three points to 33 points, Doble is high in confidence ahead of the championship run-in.

“I feel pretty confident for the last two rounds. Hopefully we can put our unreliability behind us now, just focus on the driving.

“If it’s down to me, I’ve got faith in the speed of the car, I’ve got faith in me, so I think we’d better bring it home.