Tom Ingram grabs third pole of the season at Oulton Park

Tom Ingram scored his third pole position of the season in qualifying for the British Touring Car Championship at Oulton Park, just over a tenth of a second ahead of title rival Ash Sutton.

Ingram topped all three of the qualifying sessions he took part in, including going fastest in the ‘Quick Six’ session, smashing the qualifying lap record by over six tenths of a second.

The EXCELR8 Motorsport driver’s lap of 1 minute 24.194 seconds was good enough to leave him 0.124 seconds clear of NAPA Racing UK’s Sutton, despite the two drivers being amongst those with the least available hybrid boost in the field.

The result gives Ingram his ninth career pole in the BTCC and means he has now scored more poles this year than in any of his previous campaigns.

Sutton’s team-mate Dan Cammish was third, less than a tenth off his team-mate, and will share the second row of the grid for Sunday’s opening race with EXCELR8’s Tom Chilton, who put in a season-best qualifying effort with fourth by getting through to Q3 for the second meeting in a row.

NAPA’s Daniel Rowbottom, who had been fastest in second practice, ended up fifth in qualifying, having only just scraped into the final session after losing a faster time in Q2 for exceeding track limits.

Adam Morgan was the only BMW driver to make it into Q3, but the Lancashire ace was over half a second off the pole pace in sixth.

Laser Tools Racing’s Jake Hill was the leading driver to miss out on progressing to Q3, although the BMW driver was still pleased with a seventh-place starting spot for race one.

Power Maxed Racing’s Árón Taylor-Smith couldn’t quite replicate his practice pace and ended up in eighth as the leading Vauxhall.

BMW’s Colin Turkington and Speedworks Motorsport’s Josh Cook completed the top ten, the latter as the leading Toyota driver, despite having trailed his team-mates in both of the earlier practice sessions.

Toyota’s Rob Huff was 11^th, whilst Aiden Moffat, in the sister car, progressed beyond Q1 for the first time this year only to put his Corolla in 12^th.

Power Maxed’s Mikey Doble was the quickest driver to not get out of Q1, ending up in 13^th, ahead of Toyota’s Andrew Watson in 14^th.

EXCELR8’s Ronan Pearson was 15^th, after missing out on Q2 by just under two tenths of a second, ahead of the leading CUPRA of Restart Racing’s Chris Smiley in 16^th.

Race one is scheduled to get underway at 12:25 BST on Sunday.

‘Quick Six’ results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	80		Tom INGRAM	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:24.194	–
2	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:24.318	0.124
3	27		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:24.391	0.197
4	3		Tom CHILTON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	5	1:24.497	0.303
5	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:24.502	0.308
6	33		Adam MORGAN	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:24.782	0.588

Q2 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	80		Tom INGRAM	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	5	1:24.354	–
2	27		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:24.469	0.115
3	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:24.582	0.228
4	33		Adam MORGAN	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:24.583	0.229
5	3		Tom CHILTON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:24.599	0.245
6	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:24.661	0.307
7	24		Jake HILL	Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:24.710	0.356
8	40		Árón TAYLOR-SMITH	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	6	1:24.805	0.451
9	20		Colin TURKINGTON	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:24.873	0.519
10	66		Josh COOK	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	7	1:24.894	0.540
11	12		Rob HUFF	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	7	1:24.992	0.638
12	16		Aiden MOFFAT	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:25.020	0.666

Q1 Group 2 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	80		Tom INGRAM	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	5	1:24.628	–
2	3		Tom CHILTON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	5	1:24.866	0.238
3	27		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:24.944	0.316
4	16		Aiden MOFFAT	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:25.056	0.428
5	24		Jake HILL	Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:25.101	0.473
6	66		Josh COOK	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:25.102	0.474
7	88		Mikey DOBLE	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	6	1:25.103	0.475
8	222		Chris SMILEY	Restart Racing	CUPRA Leon	6	1:25.368	0.740
9	18		Daryl DELEON	Duckhams Racing with Bartercard	CUPRA Leon	6	1:25.814	1.186
10	22		Nick HALSTEAD	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:27.524	2.896

Q1 Group 1 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:24.486	–
2	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:24.498	0.012
3	33		Adam MORGAN	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	6	1:24.578	0.092
4	12		Rob HUFF	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:24.930	0.444
5	20		Colin TURKINGTON	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:25.068	0.582
6	40		Árón TAYLOR-SMITH	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	6	1:25.104	0.618
7	11		Andrew WATSON	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:25.250	0.764
8	14		Ronan PEARSON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:25.285	0.799
9	77		Sam OSBORNE	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:25.764	1.278
10	29		Scott SUMPTON	Restart Racing	CUPRA Leon	6	1:25.901	1.415