Jake Hill reigns supreme in damp Snetterton qualifying

Jake Hill scored his third British Touring Car Championship pole position in a weather-affected qualifying session at Snetterton, more than eight tenths of a second ahead of points leader Ash Sutton.

In a session which was affected by light rain showers throughout, the track began to dry up near the end, which meant Hill, who was one of the last to complete a lap, was able to bag pole with a time of 2 minutes and 0.876 seconds.

Such were the improving track conditions, that times in Q3 were almost nine seconds faster than in Q2 just 15 minutes earlier.

Just moments before Hill’s lap, NAPA Racing UK’s Sutton had gone quickest, before Laser Tools Racing’s Hill denied the four-time champion and kept the WSR-run BMWs on top of the times, as they had done so all day.

A late lap from Team BMW’s Adam Morgan – who had started the day with a crash in first practice and then had a spin at Riches in Q2 – saw him put himself in third for the opening race, the only other driver within a second of Hill at 0.991 seconds adrift.

NAPA Racing’s Dan Cammish was fourth, with WSR’s latest signing Bobby Thompson an impressive fifth.

Speedworks Motorsport’s Josh Cook was the leading Toyota driver in sixth, the 32-year-old’s efforts being curtailed early when he had a spin at the Esses on his final flying lap in Q3, leaving him over two and a half seconds adrift on the drying circuit.

A late improvement by Morgan in Q2 denied both of the factory-backed Toyotas from proceeding beyond Q2; Andrew Watson was seventh fastest, with team-mate Rob Huff just 56 thousandths of a second behind in eighth.

The top ten was completed by BMW’s Colin Turkington, the BMW driver lamenting the lack of hybrid power available to him, and NAPA Racing’s Daniel Rowbottom.

Chris Smiley was an impressive 11^th quickest for Restart Racing in the best of the CUPRAs.

It was a difficult session for EXCELR8 Motorsport, which saw 12^th-placed Ronan Pearson the best of its quartet.

Tom Ingram failed to progress beyond Q1 and will start the opening race from 13^th on the grid, having been over a second and a half of the pace in his Group 1 session, in which he just missed the cut with seventh.

Tom Chilton will join his EXCELR8 team-mate on the seventh row of the grid in 14^th, having been directly behind his team-mate in their Q1 group.

Árón Taylor-Smith was the best of the Power Maxed Racing duo, putting his Vauxhall in 15^th in the combined ranking, having narrowly missed the cut in his Q1 group, where he was seventh fastest.

His team-mate Mikey Doble was 16ht in the combined classification, ahead of Speedworks’ Aiden Moffat (17^th), Restart Racing’s Scott Sumpton (18^th), Unlimited Motorsport’s Daryl DeLeon (19^th), NAPA Racing’s Sam Osborne (20^th) and EXCELR8’s Nick Halstead (21^st).

Race one is scheduled to get underway at 11:35 BST on Sunday.

‘Quick Six’ result

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	24		Jake HILL	Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	5	2:00.876	–
2	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	4	2:01.681	0.805
3	33		Adam MORGAN	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	5	2:01.867	0.991
4	27		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	4	2:02.423	1.547
5	19		Bobby THOMPSON	Zeus Cloud Racing with WSR	BMW 330e M Sport	4	2:02.560	1.684
6	66		Josh COOK	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	4	2:03.429	2.553

Q2 result

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	24		Jake HILL	Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	4	2:09.732	–
2	19		Bobby THOMPSON	Zeus Cloud Racing with WSR	BMW 330e M Sport	5	2:10.205	0.473
3	27		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	5	2:10.318	0.586
4	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	5	2:10.438	0.706
5	66		Josh COOK	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	4	2:10.790	1.058
6	33		Adam MORGAN	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	5	2:10.791	1.059
7	11		Andrew WATSON	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	4	2:10.871	1.139
8	12		Rob HUFF	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	4	2:10.926	1.194
9	20		Colin TURKINGTON	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	4	2:10.932	1.200
10	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	4	2:10.949	1.217
11	222		Chris SMILEY	Restart Racing	CUPRA Leon	4	2:11.345	1.613
12	14		Ronan PEARSON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	3	2:11.450	1.718

Q1 Group 2 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	1		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	4	2:11.342	–
2	27		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	5	2:12.032	0.690
3	66		Josh COOK	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	4	2:12.425	1.083
4	32		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	5	2:12.461	1.119
5	33		Adam MORGAN	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	5	2:12.678	1.336
6	222		Chris SMILEY	Restart Racing	CUPRA Leon	5	2:12.908	1.566
7	40		Árón TAYLOR-SMITH	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	5	2:13.302	1.960
8	88		Mikey DOBLE	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	5	2:13.500	2.158
9	18		Daryl DELEON	Duckhams Racing with Bartercard	CUPRA Leon	5	2:13.900	2.558
10	77		Sam OSBORNE	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	5	2:15.699	4.357

Q1 Group 1 results

POS	NO	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	GAP
1	24		Jake HILL	Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	4	2:10.620	–
2	19		Bobby THOMPSON	Zeus Cloud Racing with WSR	BMW 330e M Sport	5	2:11.231	0.611
3	12		Rob HUFF	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	3	2:11.650	1.030
4	20		Colin TURKINGTON	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	5	2:11.730	1.110
5	11		Andrew WATSON	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	5	2:11.993	1.373
6	14		Ronan PEARSON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	4	2:12.199	1.579
7	80		Tom INGRAM	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	4	2:12.218	1.598
8	3		Tom CHILTON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	3	2:12.336	1.716
9	16		Aiden MOFFAT	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	4	2:13.523	2.903
10	29		Scott SUMPTON	Restart Racing	CUPRA Leon	4	2:13.592	2.972
11	22		Nick HALSTEAD	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	4	2:15.721	5.101