Jake Hill bounces back at Snetterton in ‘unbelievable’ weekend

Jake Hill bounced back into British Touring Car Championship title contention at Snetterton with a dominant double victory, including scoring his first pole position in BMW machinery.

Having had a poor weekend the last time out at Brands Hatch, Hill was on imperious form throughout his weekend in Norfolk.

First and third in Saturday’s practice sessions, Hill then went on to dominate qualifying as he emerged fastest in each of the three sessions he took part in, claiming his third career pole in the BTCC.

The 30-year-old scored a lights-to-flag victory in a dry opening race of the day, bagging his first win of the season.

A heavy downpour before race two created a tyre choice headache, but Hill stayed on the wet tyre. Jumping the start, Hill was soon handed a ten-second time penalty for the mistake, but he set about building up a leading margin to undo the penalty.

In the end, Hill dominated the race, which saw a second rain shower late on as the wet tyre was just looking to start struggling.

That aided Hill, and he won by over 16 seconds, which was still a comfortable margin of six seconds after his penalty was applied.

The top nine were reversed for the final race of the day, in which Hill would have had to run on the hard tyre. However, to avoid that, he started the race on wets, even though conditions were drying up.

Early in the race, Hill’s tyres allowed him to leap into the lead and extend a margin of over seven seconds at its biggest.

However, slick tyres quickly became the rubber to be on and Hill’s pace faded, with him ultimately slipping to ninth by the chequered flag.

The second-best weekend of Hill’s BTCC career has thus moved him from 36 points adrift to just 11 points shy of the points lead, although he remains fourth overall.

“What can I say really?! It’s been an unbelievable weekend here at Snetterton – made even better by how the team and I have bounced back from Brands,” said Hill.

“My BMW has been on the button from the first time we rolled out the pitlane and I owe so much to Craig [Porley, race engineer] and my #24 WSR car crew for that.

“I am proud of how I have performed too – that drive in race two was, I think, probably the best and most professional race of my life.

“To get my first pole position in the iconic Laser Tools Racing colours, to collect two victories and to put ourselves well and truly back in the fight is everything I could have asked for this weekend.

“I’ve had such amazing support around me this week both on and off the track and I can’t thank everyone involved enough.”