Tom Ingram has likened the racing in the British Touring Car Championship (BTCC) at Silverstone to being “a bit like playing pinball” after the Speedworks Motorsport driver spent the weekend racing in the middle of the pack.
Ingram’s weekend started on a strong note, with the Toyota racer putting his car seventh on the girds for the first race in qualifying. That would be as high as the 22-year-old got all weekend, however, as he went on to score three points finishes around the fringes of the top ten.
Whilst race one yielded a top ten finish with ninth, races two and three saw him just miss out on the top ten, but still collect a consistent haul of points.
Race thre was the most physical of them all for Ingram, who was collected by another competitors at the start of the race, upsetting the balance of his Avensis thereafter.
“It was a bit like playing pinball; [there was contact] left, right and centre, to be honest with you,” Ingram told TouringCars.Net. “Just before the safety car came out we got fired royally [off] at Luffield. I don’t know who it was by, whether it was Aiden [Moffat] or whoever, but I ended up getting clattered in the side. It knocked all the rear toe out, knocked the steering out of centre and it changed the balance of the car slightly.
“At the restart it never felt like it was back in tune. It meant the second half of the race we were a bit up against it and trying to have a bit of a recovery at the same time as trying to move forwards. It was a long race.”
Having lamented being caught up in the pack at Silverstone, preventing a quick enough lap time for the race two grid, Ingram admits that he needs to work on his qualifying efforts in order to push further up the grid.
“The reason Rockingham worked so well for us in race three is because we got that reverse grid draw. Had we had a situation like that where we’d had a decent qualifying, then I think we could have done it again.
“Our pace has been there all year, we just haven’t been in a position to maximise it, so had we have qualified in the top three somewhere, I think we’d be having an entirely different conversation right now.”
With Ingram’s second season in the BTCC coming to an end, he says he is looking to end the season on a high at Brands Hatch, with top five finishes and a podium result the target.
“I think we’ve got to aim for some decent finishes [at Brands Hatch]. We know that there’s guys fighting for a championship and at the same time we’re effectively going for glory and only going for podiums and things like that. It puts us in a slightly different position.
“This place [Silverstone] was never going to suit us and at Brands we should hopefully be back on the pace. I’d like to think we can finish off the season with some top fives and possibly a podium in race three.”