Colin Turkington grabs pole position in red-flag interrupted Croft qualifying

Team BMW’s Colin Turkington secured pole position in a thrice red-flagged British Touring Car Championship qualifying session at Croft, beating Team Dynamics’ Daniel Rowbottom by less than a tenth of a second.

Racing in the chassis which he used to win the 2019 title, Turkington hit the top of the times with just four minutes remaining of the session, which was ultimately halted for a third time with only 45 seconds remaining due to an off-track incident for Michael Crees.

The Northern Irishman’s pole time was almost three tenths of a second under the qualifying lap record posted in 2019, as he edged out the Honda of Rowbottom by 0.027 seconds.

Excelr8 Motorsport’s Daniel Lloyd was third, having himself been top of the times for eight minutes prior to Turkington usurping him, the Hyundai driver also being within a tenth of the top BMW.

Tom Ingram put his Hyundai in fourth, 0.076 seconds from pole, ahead of the second Team Dynamics car of Gordon Shedden in fifth.

MB Motorsport’s Jake Hill was sixth, ahead of NAPA Racing’s Ash Sutton in seventh, the latter improving on his practice performance but being three tenths off the pace.

Excelr8’s Tom Chilton earned a best qualifying performance of the season with eighth, whilst the top ten was completed by the Ciceley Motorsport BMW of George Gamble and the Laser Tools Racing Infiniti of Aiden Moffat.

Toyota’s Rory Butcher just missed out on the top ten and was 11^th, ahead of the BMW of Stephen Jelley in 12^th.

Although Bobby Thompson was unable to repeat his performance from second practice, the team HARD driver did manage to better his season-best qualifying position to end up in 13^th.

The second NAPA Ford of Dan Cammish was 14^th quickest, half a second off the pace, with the Yorkshireman having lost valuable track time in second practice when he went off track at the first corner.

Adam Morgan had originally qualified in 14^th, but because he was the cause of the first red flag after five minutes, he had his best time disallowed and dropped to 17^th. The Ciceley driver had gone off the road at the first corner on his first flying lap, skidding through the gravel and impacting the tyres. After being pushed out of the gravel he made it back to the pits for hasty repairs to his BMW.

Championship leader Josh Cook had a disastrous session. The BTC Racing driver had been struggling for pace anyway, but halfway through the session he suffered from a left-rear suspension failure, forcing him to pit for repairs and losing him track time. He eventually emerged back on track in his Honda with just over five minutes to go but couldn’t improve and ended up down in 20^th.

Although Carl Boardley was supposed to act as a stand-in driver for Rick Parfitt Jr this weekend, the 46-year-old felt unwell after shakedown on Friday and will subsequently take no further part in the event.

Session results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	50		Colin TURKINGTON	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	15	1:21.468	–
2	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	Halfords Racing with Cataclean	Honda Civic Type R	13	1:21.495	0.027
3	123		Daniel LLOYD	Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com	Hyundai i30 Fastback N	15	1:21.531	0.063
4	80		Tom INGRAM	Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com	Hyundai i30 Fastback N	12	1:21.544	0.076
5	52		Gordon SHEDDEN	Halfords Racing with Cataclean	Honda Civic Type R	13	1:21.580	0.112
6	24		Jake HILL	ROKiT MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	15	1:21.636	0.168
7	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	13	1:21.785	0.317
8	3		Tom CHILTON	Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com	Hyundai i30 Fastback N	12	1:21.797	0.329
9	42		George GAMBLE	Car Gods with Ciceley Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	16	1:21.822	0.354
10	16		Aiden MOFFAT	Laser Tools Racing	Infiniti Q50	15	1:21.828	0.360
11	6		Rory BUTCHER	Toyota GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	12	1:21.833	0.365
12	12		Stephen JELLEY	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	14	1:21.921	0.453
13	19		Bobby THOMPSON	Autobrite Direct with JourneyHero	CUPRA Leon	13	1:21.929	0.461
14	9		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	13	1:21.987	0.519
15	18		James GORNALL	Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com	Hyundai i30 Fastback N	13	1:22.009	0.541
16	21		Ricky COLLARD	Toyota GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	14	1:22.027	0.559
17	33		Adam MORGAN	Car Gods with Ciceley Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	15	1:22.043	0.575
18	11		Jason PLATO	Rich Energy BTC Racing	Honda Civic Type R	14	1:22.069	0.601
19	48		Ollie JACKSON	Apec Racing with Beavis Morgan	Ford Focus ST	14	1:22.271	0.803
20	66		Josh COOK	Rich Energy BTC Racing	Honda Civic Type R	10	1:22.280	0.812
21	777		Michael CREES	CarStore Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	13	1:22.299	0.831
22	77		Sam OSBORNE	Apec Racing with Beavis Morgan	Ford Focus ST	15	1:22.329	0.861
23	97		Ash HAND	CarStore Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	14	1:22.395	0.927
24	40		Árón TAYLOR-SMITH	Yazoo with Safuu.com Racing	CUPRA Leon	13	1:22.736	1.268
25	99		Jade EDWARDS	Rich Energy BTC Racing	Honda Civic Type R	12	1:22.781	1.313
26	28		Nicolas HAMILTON	Yazoo with Safuu.com Racing	CUPRA Leon	6	1:23.731	2.263
27	20		Will POWELL	Autobrite Direct with JourneyHero	CUPRA Leon	12	1:24.103	2.635
28	17		Dexter PATTERSON	Laser Tools Racing	Infiniti Q50	3	No time	N/A
29	41		Carl BOARDLEY	Uptonsteel with Euro Car Parts Racing	Infiniti Q50	0	No time	N/A