Tom Ingram tightens title race with win in red-flagged Silverstone finale

Tom Ingram claimed victory in an extremely wet, red flag-interrupted final British Touring Car Championship race of the day at Silverstone, despite a last-lap lunge from Ash Sutton.

Just as the race was beginning, further heavy rain descended on Silverstone, creating the wettest conditions of the day so far.

Reverse-grid pole-sitter Chris Smiley didn’t make the best of starts, allowing EXCELR8 Motorsport’s Ingram to go around the outside at Copse as NAPA Racing UK’s Dan Cammish also slipped through on the inside.

However, Cammish was almost immediately caught out by the conditions at Becketts, aquaplaning straight on and down to 13^th as Smiley was able to retake second.

NAPA’s Sutton put in a superb opening lap, rising to sixth, before gaining another three places on the next lap, including a crucial pass on Hill into Brooklands.

However, conditions were worsening and on lap three Team BMW’s Colin Turkington aquaplaned off the circuit at Copse, an omen of what was to come for the Northern Irishman.

On the next lap, Turkington aquaplaned off the circuit again at Becketts, this time beaching his car in the gravel as the safety car was called due to both the worsening conditions and the stricken BMW.

The field followed the safety car for five laps before the red flags flew due to the poor conditions, which resulted in a half-hour stoppage to the race.

During the delay, there was much uncertainty as to whether the race would even be restarted, due to the continuing rain and the 18:30 curfew at the circuit.

Racing eventually resumed at 17:55, initially with four laps behind the safety car before getting underway in anger on lap 13.

Ingram maintained his advantage, but it was Sutton on the move, making quick work of getting by Speedworks Motorsport’s Josh Cook for second into Maggots.

Thereafter followed half a dozen laps of Sutton and Ingram trading the fastest lap, as Sutton sought to keep the pressure on the leading Hyundai and find a way past.

Having made a mistake five laps from the end which dropped him back to over a second behind Ingram, Sutton was back on the tail of his rival by the final lap. Despite final corner contact between the pair, Ingram held on to win from Sutton, with Cook completing the podium.

Laser Tools Racing’s Jake Hill was fourth, passing Toyota’s Rob Huff for the place seven laps into the restart at Luffield, and thus holds a slender two-point advantage over Ingram heading to the season finale next month.

Huff was knocked further down the order in contact with Dan Zelos at Copse on the next lap, handing fifth to Cammish, who passed Zelos for the place on the penultimate lap.

Zelos secured a career-best sixth, ahead of BMW’s Adam Morgan in seventh and Huff, who took eighth.

The top ten was completed by Power Maxed Racing’s Árón Taylor-Smith and NAPA’s Sam Osborne, who finished where they started.

Race result

POS	NO	CL	NAT	DRIVER	ENTRANT	CAR	LAPS	TIME	BEST	GD
1	80	M		Tom INGRAM	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	25	58:51.030	1:03.340	3
2	1	M		Ashley SUTTON	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	25	0.293	1:03.385	12
3	66	M		Josh COOK	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	25	6.234	1:03.689	4
4	24	M		Jake HILL	Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	BMW 330e M Sport	25	12.255	1:04.023	6
5	27	M		Dan CAMMISH	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	25	13.541	1:03.928	2
6	45	M		Dan ZELOS	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	25	13.966	1:04.080	8
7	33	M		Adam MORGAN	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	25	17.341	1:04.502	7
8	12	M		Rob HUFF	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	25	19.014	1:04.527	11
9	40	I		Árón TAYLOR-SMITH	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	25	19.366	1:04.655	9
10	77	M		Sam OSBORNE	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	25	20.986	1:04.614	10
11	88	I		Mikey DOBLE	Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	Vauxhall Astra	25	21.317	1:04.456	14
12	3	M		Tom CHILTON	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	25	22.693	1:04.492	20
13	18	I		Daryl DELEON	Duckhams Racing with Bartercard	CUPRA Leon	25	23.329	1:04.675	19
14	11	M		Andrew WATSON	TOYOTA GAZOO Racing UK	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	25	24.494	1:04.675	15
15	32	M		Daniel ROWBOTTOM	NAPA Racing UK	Ford Focus ST	25	26.077	1:04.365	13
16	222	I		Chris SMILEY	Restart Racing	CUPRA Leon	25	26.502	1:04.138	1
17	29	I		Scott SUMPTON	Restart Racing	CUPRA Leon	25	28.261	1:04.685	16
18	22	M		Nick HALSTEAD	BRISTOL STREET MOTORS	Hyundai i30 N Fastback	25	29.463	1:04.899	18
R	20	M		Colin TURKINGTON	Team BMW	BMW 330e M Sport	3	DNF	1:11.183	5
R	16	M		Aiden MOFFAT	LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	Toyota Corolla GR Sport	3	DNF	1:12.525	17