Tom Ingram grabs Thruxton pole

EXCELR8 Motorsport’s Tom Ingram secured pole position for the opening British Touring Car Championship race at Thruxton, pipping NAPA Racing UK’s Dan Cammish by just over a quarter of a second.

Ingram bagged his eighth career pole, and his second of the season, with a lap of 1 minute 15.379 seconds under mostly sunny skies at the Hampshire circuit, which was just under four tenths than the lap record for the current generation of cars, posted two years ago.

NAPA Racing UK’s Cammish, who had himself taken that lap record in 2022, was his closest challenger, albeit 0.265 seconds off the Hyundai driver, the 35-year-old having been struggling with illness in the run up to the weekend.

Laser Tools Racing’s Jake Hill was third, two hundredths of a second further back, a result which the WSR driver was pleased with as the leading BMW driver.

Daniel Rowbottom was fourth, and thus will line up directly behind team-mate Cammish, despite having topped the times in Q2. Rowbottom was ultimately three tenths slower than he had been just 15 minutes before after a slide at the Complex cost him time.

Reigning champion Ash Sutton was an impressive fifth, maintaining his record of being the only driver to get into Q3 at every event this year, just under half a second off pole.

EXCELR8’s Tom Chilton completed the ‘Quick Six’ drivers, along with Ingram being one of only two drivers to complete two warm-up laps on his hard compound tyres, albeit to little effect.

BMW’s Adam Morgan was seventh, missing the cut to get into Q3 by a mere 0.009 seconds, ahead of Speedworks Motorsport’s Josh Cook in eighth, who was pipped by Morgan at the very end of Q2.

“We made progress for sure, but it’s not quite quick enough,” said Cook. “We know where the car is strong and it’s not necessarily the high-speed corners. I’m happy; we can race from there.”

Toyota’s Andrew Watson and BMW’s Colin Turkington completed the top ten.

Power Maxed Racing duo Mikey Doble and Árón Taylor-Smith were 11^th and 12^th respectively, the latter having had a big crash backwards into the tyres in Q1 which caused considerable damage to his left-rear suspension.

Taylor-Smith crabbed his way back to the pits for repairs, and ultimately lapped just a tenth behind team-mate Doble despite hasty repairs carried out by the team.

Toyota’s Rob Huff was the fastest driver to fail to progress beyond Q1, putting his car in 13^th, and missing progression to Q2 by just under a tenth of a second. “I had big oversteer biting me in all the wrong places,” said Huff. “Even on the lap I did we had a big moment.”

Fellow Toyota racer Aiden Moffat will start 14^th, meaning he has failed to get out of Q1 all season so far.

NAPA’s Sam Osborne was 15^th, ahead of the leading CUPRA of Unlimited Motorsport’s Daryl DeLeon in 16^th.

EXCELR8’s Ronan Pearson failed to get out to complete a lap at all after a throttle issue in qualifying, leaving him to start from 20^th and last for race one.

‘Quick Six’ results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	100		Tom INGRAM	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:15.379	–
2	27		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:15.644	0.265
3	24		Jake HILL	Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	6	1:15.668	0.289
4	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	7	1:15.678	0.299
5	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	7	1:15.822	0.443
6	3		Tom CHILTON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:16.139	0.760

Q2 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:15.388	–
2	100		Tom INGRAM	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:15.614	0.226
3	24		Jake HILL	Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	6	1:15.799	0.411
4	3		Tom CHILTON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:15.910	0.522
5	27		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	7	1:16.012	0.624
6	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	7	1:16.158	0.770
7	33		Adam MORGAN	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:16.167	0.779
8	66		Josh COOK	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	5	1:16.172	0.784
9	11		Andrew WATSON	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:16.396	1.008
10	20		Colin TURKINGTON	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:16.476	1.088
11	88		Mikey DOBLE	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	6	1:16.513	1.125
12	40		Árón TAYLOR-SMITH	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	3	1:16.629	1.241

Q1 Group 2 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:15.908	–
2	3		Tom CHILTON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:16.285	0.377
3	24		Jake HILL	Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:16.303	0.395
4	40		Árón TAYLOR-SMITH	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	5	1:16.411	0.503
5	88		Mikey DOBLE	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	6	1:16.745	0.837
6	20		Colin TURKINGTON	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:16.833	0.925
7	16		Aiden MOFFAT	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:17.278	1.370
8	77		Sam OSBORNE	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	7	1:17.470	1.562
9	18		Daryl DELEON	Duckhams Racing with Bartercard	CUPRA Leon	6	1:17.733	1.825
10	22		Nick HALSTEAD	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:19.129	3.221

Q1 Group 1 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	27		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	7	1:16.216	–
2	100		Tom INGRAM	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	6	1:16.384	0.168
3	66		Josh COOK	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:16.684	0.468
4	33		Adam MORGAN	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	7	1:16.827	0.611
5	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	6	1:16.885	0.669
6	11		Andrew WATSON	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:16.896	0.680
7	12		Rob HUFF	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	6	1:16.979	0.763
8	222		Chris SMILEY	Restart Racing	CUPRA Leon	6	1:18.017	1.801
9	29		Scott SUMPTON	Restart Racing	CUPRA Leon	6	1:18.997	2.781
10	14		Ronan PEARSON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	0	No time	N/A