Jake Hill ‘a bit gutted’ with Brands Hatch qualifying effort

MB Motorsport’s Jake Hill admitted that he was ‘a bit gutted’ not to out-perform title rival Ash Sutton in Saturday’s British Touring Car Championship qualifying session at Brands Hatch.

Hill put his WSR-run BMW on the third row of the grid in fifth for Sunday’s opening race, missing out on pole by half a second to fellow championship contender Tom Ingram.

His result means that he ends the year with the best average qualifying result, bagging him the Goodyear Wingfoot Award.

Whilst Hill is pleased to secure that accolade, he was still disappointed with his overall qualifying effort.

“At least I’ve won one championship this weekend,” said Hill. “It’s a nice thing to have, definitely. We worked our little socks off in qualifying this year.

“I think the only time we qualified outside the top ten was at Oulton Park when we had a little mishap with Tom Chilton, but nevertheless, it’s been a fantastic year of qualifying and nice to win this lovely trophy.

“I’m less pleased by today’s result, but it is what it is. The gap to the front row is very close, but pole is just so far away.

“It’s good to be the best BMW driver today, but I probably cost myself half a tenth trying too hard.

“I’m still reasonably satisfied because I feel it’s one of the best laps I’ve driven all year. I’m a bit gutted because I needed to out-qualify Ash to have a bit of an easier time of it.

“But it’s British Touring Cars… It’s not supposed to be easy. And Sunday’s another day. Anything can happen, the BMW is rapid and I’ll give it everything to become champion.”

Hill is expecting it to be very difficult to beat Ingram on race day, given the Excelr8 Motorsport driver was four tenths of a second clear of anyone else.

“I don’t know what Tom’s got under the bonnet, that thing is too fast! We couldn’t catch him all of today, no one could really.

“He is going to be extremely hard to beat tomorrow. We’ve got to pull our socks up and just go for it; whatever happens, happens.”