INTERVIEW: Jason Plato on “selling himself” to Frank Williams and silencing his critics

We invited Plato to Goodwood as we prepare to celebrate the Super Touring era at the 83^rd Members’ Meeting presented by Audrain Motorsport, where we spoke to him about the events that brought him to touring car racing and what it was like to be a driver during that time.

“My dream of F1 went many years ago, in 1993 when I just ran out of money,” he said. He’d spent subsequent years working as a race driving instructor when a friend from Renault, Tim Jackson, suggested he enter the newly created Renault Spider Cup in 1996.

Plato’s immediate response was rebuttal, but when informed that the winner of the series would be given an opportunity to test with the Williams Touring Car team, his outlook changed. It was 1991 British Touring Car Champion Will Hoy who was out of contract at the end of 1996, and Plato was determined to have a shot at claiming his vacant seat.

It was quite the diversion from his initial racing career, where he had climbed the ranks through Formula Renault and into British Formula 3, but the opportunity to impress Frank Williams was a mighty one.

He won nine of the 13 races to dominate the Championship and claim his chance to test the Williams Renault Laguna.

“The test went well,” Plato said. “Renault UK were trying really hard to get me in the team and I went and had an interview with Frank [Williams]. But he was honest and he said, ‘you don’t have the right profile; we need an ex-F1 driver’ and that was the end of it.”

Or at least, it should’ve been. Barely two weeks later, Plato was knocking on the door of the Williams offices to demand a second conversation with the man in charge.

“I thought ‘I’m not having this’. I went and doorstepped him. I waltzed in, obviously I’d made an impression the first time I was there, I got to know some security guards and then I was kicked out by Nicola, his PA.

“She tore some strips off me, but she let out this perfect piece of information, which I still think to this day she let out on purpose: ‘he’s not in until lunchtime’.

“So, I waited in the carpark for three hours, ran after his car when it came in and just begged and pleaded with him to give me five minutes of his time, which, eventually, he did.”

His determination paid off, because within a week, Plato received the call that he would be testing again at Snetterton in direct competition against former Formula 1 drivers Jean-Christophe Boullion and Gianni Morbidelli. “Best man gets a job”.

Plato was the best man, and he earned himself a drive at one of the top teams in the BTCC, under the watchful eye of the man who led the World Championship-winning F1 team.

“I sold myself to the great Frank Williams, he believed in me and he gave me a chance, and it completely changed my life. I think about him a lot, he was a very good friend, he put his neck on the block to give me a chance.”

It’s moments like that that often define the greatest motorsport careers, and Plato’s career had been revived from the brink.

But after forcing himself into the fold, he had to prove that he belonged on one of the most competitive grids anywhere in the world. A young star with no notable experience in touring car racing was about to go up against the best in the world.

His initial challenge was to shut out the whispers that followed him through the paddock. There were many who felt Plato’s position at Renault was undeserved, that he had been gifted a place within the best team on the grid.

“It was tricky, but only in my own head really,” Plato considered. “I didn’t care what anybody said, it was just the green-eyed monster. I’m here, I deserve to be here, it didn’t resonate.

“I knew I was in the best team at the best time, but I also knew I made it happen through tenacity, dogged determination and just having the balls to go and have a go and doorstep Frank.”

One thing that is perhaps overlooked with a driver like Plato is just how dedicated he was — and remains — to his racing. Where other drivers might consider their responsibilities to begin and end at the wheel of a racing car, Plato sought to set himself apart as a hands-on member of the team.

“I was in the factory nearly every day, because it was my new family. I wanted to know everybody, I wanted to know what everybody did, I wanted to try and work with the media people, with the marketing team.

“That was my golden opportunity, so I wanted to learn everything and be as proactive as possible. I volunteered for everything because I wanted to be the guy who worked really hard.

“Alain [Menu] couldn’t be bothered with the PR and that sort of stuff, and I enjoy that part of it, so I’d volunteer for this and that and I’d end up in a race suit down the middle of the Brompton Road at an Elf petrol station fuelling up people’s cars. What was I doing? But I just put myself forward for it.”

All the hard work paid off, because he took pole position on each of his first three appearances in the BTCC. Any doubters were immediately silenced; the debutant had unequivocally proven his speed.

Plato’s second-place finish on his debut at Donnington, following home his illustrious team-mate Menu, was a near perfect start to his touring car career, and above all else helped him to pack away any doubts in his own mind.

“To get pole position on my debut, not once, not twice, but three times at two different events was just great. I thought, ‘oh my god I’ve arrived, I deserve to be here’.

“Seeing the replays of John Russell, the chief designer at Williams, and his reaction of approval to then turn round to Alain Menu and see his face, I’ll never forget that.

“I beat my illustrious team-mate, who I’ll be forever indebted to for all the things I learned off him. He was the finest touring car driver in the world at that point.

“Those days were quite something.”

His performances were all the more high-profile given the Super Touring era had reached its peak of popularity. The BTCC was being broadcast live to homes across the UK, and the likes of Plato and Menu had become household names. Their cars were strewn across the bedroom walls of motorsport fans young and old, and a whole new audience were reenacting their exploits on the TOCA Touring Cars video game.

But more than that, there was no better motorsport show on the planet, and Plato clearly struggles to hide his adoration for that period.

“The racing was fantastic. Nearly everyone on the grid was a professional driver being paid, so the quality of racing was second to none. That’s not to say that there weren’t any thugs or villains out there — of course there were, it’s touring cars.

“We were working with the best in the business, and Rickard [Rydell] could say the same for TWR. There was RML, West Surrey Racing, there were some really class acts with great resources and brilliant engineers, and everyday there was something to talk about, some other development which was going on.”

There was an intensity to the sport at that time. Several high-profile and hugely driven manufacturers competing with enormous budgets in search of even greater rewards.

“With Williams there were 50 people in the team, 50 competitive people really motivated and working hard, and that was the same at Volvo, Honda, Audi."

“But we were so busy during the weekends that we didn’t really have time to go and feel the mood of the paddock. We were just focused on the intensity of what you’re being paid to do. Let’s not forget we were employees, we had to do our jobs, but that was magical.

“But did we feel tension because of the competition? No, we all loved it, we were revelling in it.”

Plato claimed the first of his four victories with the Williams Renault team at Snetterton in 1997 and won the final race of the ‘97 season to clinch third place in the Drivers’ Championship. But he recalled learning one of his most important lessons on that day, when Menu failed to obey a team-order that would have seen him clinch second in the standings: "Never trust another racing driver.”

That season turned out to be his best in the Super Touring era, which continued until its conclusion at the end of the 2000 season, but Plato’s overwhelming memory of that time came a year prior, when Williams — the team that had given him his break in a sport that he would go on to have immense success — pulled the plug on its own Super Touring programme.

“I’d never really felt emotions like that before,” he said. “It was the end of an era, and a great era.”

Over the next 20 years Plato became one of the most successful drivers in the history of the BTCC. His 97 race wins remains a record, and his tally of two Championships ranks him alongside the man from whom he learned so much, Alain Menu.

Those earliest days of his incredible career will be brought back to life this year at Goodwood, during the Super Touring celebration at the 83^rd Members’ Meeting. Plans to bring together the largest ever collection of Super Tourers at the Motor Circuit are in full swing, and a demonstration of these unforgettable cars will no doubt send the senses into overdrive.

“There’s no doubt that these cars are spectacular to see and also to hear on track,” Plato told us. “Unlike most other racing series as they are now, they’re all normally aspirated, they make a fantastic noise as they’re coming towards you, the induction roar.

“The Shoot-Out will be great, they’re all similar in terms of speed and lap times. If they’re being driven correctly, the spectacle’s going to be fantastic.”

We can assure you they will be driven correctly, by six of the finest touring car drivers to ever turn a wheel.

The 83^rd Members' Meeting presented by Audrain Motorsport takes place on the 18^th & 19^th April 2026. Tickets are limited, with only Sunday admission remaining. Saturday tickets, weekend passes and grandstand passes are now sold out. 

You can sign up for the Fellowship now. Click here to find out more.

Goodwood photography by Max Carter and Joe Harding.