Tom Ingram hopeful of strong qualifying after impressive practice

Tom Ingram believes there is still more to come from his Speedworks Motorsport Toyota Avensis, after scoring two top five laps in the free practice sessions.

The 21-year-old set the fourth fastest time in FP2, having taken the second fastest time in FP1 earlier in the morning. Despite the impressive pace of the Toyota, Ingram believes there is still more to come from the car.

“We’re fairly happy going in to qualifying,” Ingram told TouringCarTimes. “We know we’ve got a lot of time still to find which is fairly promising. We’ve got a few parts we’ve put on which should make a nice improvement in the car so we know we’ve got more to come.

“I think there’s no reason we shouldn’t go quicker in qualifying, we’re all fairly confident, the car’s running really good. We know that qualifying’s one thing and racing is totally different so we’ve got to make sure not only we’re quick for qualifying but we’re quick over the race as well.”

The 2014 Oulton Park races, held on the full International layout, were notable for their lack of overtaking, but even returning to the Island layout will not make overtaking any easier according to Ingram.

“Although they’ve changed the circuit it’s exactly the same,” he said. “The last place you want to be is in the middle of the pack going down to that hairpin for the first lap, there’s a certain amount of inevitability about it. We know that we’ve got to have a decent qualifying and stay out of trouble for the race and bring it home.”