Dan Cammish quickest in cool opening practice at Brands Hatch

Dan Cammish emerged with the fastest time in the opening British Touring Car Championship practice session at Brands Hatch, posting the fastest lap in the final seconds of the session.

It took more than 20 minutes for times from the top drivers to appear on the board, with track temperatures under cool but clear skies being just 9 degrees at the start of the 40-minute session.

Team BMW’s Colin Turkington was the first of the top drivers to go fastest, but it wasn’t until the final minutes when the true times began to appear, with Toyota’s Rory Butcher, Team Dynamics’ Gordon Shedden and Excelr8 Motorsport’s Tom Ingram all taking turns at the top.

NAPA Racing UK’s Cammish only went fastest on his final flying run, having been eighth with two minutes to go, before successively improving to third and then fastest with his last effort of 1 minute 31.418 seconds.

Ingram had put in three quick laps towards the end in his Hyundai, having failed to set a time until 35 minutes had elapsed. He ended up just 0.019 seconds behind Cammish’s Ford.

Butcher was third in his Corolla, a tenth of a second off the pace, ahead of the second Motorbase-run Ford of Ash Sutton in fourth.

Shedden was the leading Honda in fifth, ahead of another strong showing by Toyota’s Ricky Collard in sixth.

Turkington ended up in seventh, just over half a second off the pace, ahead of the Ciceley Motorsport 3 Series of George Gamble in eighth.

The top ten was completed by Gamble’s team-mate Adam Morgan and MB Motorsport’s Jake Hill, meaning that all four of the title contenders put their cars inside the top ten and within eight tenths of the pace in the first session of the weekend.

Team BMW’s Stephen Jelley improved on his final run and in doing so made it sixteen cars within a second of the pace.

It was a difficult session for BTC Racing, with no cars inside the top 20. Indeed, with just two minutes to go all three of the outfit’s Hondas were bottom of the table, with both Josh Cook and Jason Plato only posting lap times on their final efforts, leaving the latter in just 27^th.

Sam Osborne didn’t take to the circuit at all during the session.

Second practice is scheduled to get underway at 12:05 BST.

Session results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	9		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	14	1:31.418	–
2	80		Tom INGRAM	Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com	Hyundai i30 Fastback N	14	1:31.437	0.019
3	6		Rory BUTCHER	Toyota GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	15	1:31.541	0.123
4	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	15	1:31.652	0.234
5	52		Gordon SHEDDEN	Halfords Racing with Cataclean	Honda Civic Type R	19	1:31.813	0.395
6	21		Ricky COLLARD	Toyota GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	19	1:31.855	0.437
7	50		Colin TURKINGTON	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	21	1:31.932	0.514
8	42		George GAMBLE	Car Gods with Ciceley Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	13	1:31.938	0.520
9	33		Adam MORGAN	Car Gods with Ciceley Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	13	1:32.139	0.721
10	24		Jake HILL	ROKiT MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	15	1:32.175	0.757
11	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	Halfords Racing with Cataclean	Honda Civic Type R	19	1:32.187	0.769
12	777		Michael CREES	CarStore Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	19	1:32.191	0.773
13	19		Bobby THOMPSON	Autobrite Direct with JourneyHero	CUPRA Leon	12	1:32.212	0.794
14	17		Dexter PATTERSON	Laser Tools Racing	Infiniti Q50	19	1:32.339	0.921
15	123		Daniel LLOYD	Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com	Hyundai i30 Fastback N	17	1:32.370	0.952
16	12		Stephen JELLEY	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	19	1:32.398	0.980
17	40		Árón TAYLOR-SMITH	Yazoo with Safuu.com Racing	CUPRA Leon	9	1:32.433	1.015
18	16		Aiden MOFFAT	Laser Tools Racing	Infiniti Q50	15	1:32.481	1.063
19	3		Tom CHILTON	Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com	Hyundai i30 Fastback N	18	1:32.578	1.160
20	48		Ollie JACKSON	Apec Racing with Beavis Morgan	Ford Focus ST	18	1:32.977	1.559
21	66		Josh COOK	Rich Energy BTC Racing	Honda Civic Type R	7	1:33.670	2.252
22	28		Nicolas HAMILTON	Yazoo with Safuu.com Racing	CUPRA Leon	13	1:34.373	2.955
23	41		CarL BOARDLEY	Autobrite Direct with JourneyHero	CUPRA Leon	8	1:34.608	3.190
24	97		Ash HAND	CarStore Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	12	1:35.274	3.856
25	96		Jack BUTEL	Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com	Hyundai i30 Fastback N	17	1:35.533	4.115
26	62		Rick PARFITT JR	Uptonsteel with Euro Car Parts Racing	Infiniti Q50	16	1:36.038	4.620
27	11		Jason PLATO	Rich Energy BTC Racing	Honda Civic Type R	5	1:41.616	10.198
28	99		Jade EDWARDS	Rich Energy BTC Racing	Honda Civic Type R	5	1:51.479	20.061
29	77		Sam OSBORNE	Apec Racing with Beavis Morgan	Ford Focus ST	0	No time	N/A