Tom Ingram heads Snetterton qualifying after stunning pole battle

Tom Ingram secured the first pole position for the new Toyota Corolla after beating Dan Cammish to top spot in a stunning qualifying battle at Snetterton.

Cammish had earlier topped both practice sessions ahead of the sixth meeting of the BTCC season, but fell agonisingly short of completing a clean-sweep on Saturday as Speedworks racer Ingram edged him out of pole by the narrowest of margins.

The session had started with points leader Colin Turkington being the first driver to set a quick time but the West Surrey Racing man was immediately beaten by team-mate driver Andrew Jordan, who dipped below the quickest time set in either practice session on his first run.

With the BMWs expected to find the going tough after all of the non-BMW cars were given a small boost increase, it was little surprise that the duo were quickly knocked back down the order, with Cammish going under the qualifying lap record on his first timed run at the wheel of his Team Dynamics-run Honda.

That lap was immediately bettered by the older FK2 Honda of Sam Tordoff but Cammish responded immediately to become the first driver to break the 1:55s barrier on his second lap, just before an issue for Stephen Jelley saw the session halted.

Jelley’s Team Parker-run BMW had failed to set a time when it suddenly ground to a halt on track, although the Oulton Park race winner was able to get the car going and returned to the pits under his own steam just as the red flags went out.

However, having been the cause of the red flag, Jelley would take no further part in proceedings.

The session quickly got back underway with 18 minutes remaining and it was Ingram who was the man on a move, going purple in the opening sector on his first timed lap after the restart.

Running just behind Cammish – who was also improving on his earlier lap – Ingram was able to benefit from a tow from Mark Blundell’s Audi on the Bentley Straight to edge ahead of the Honda, even though Cammish also posted a new personal best.

Cammish would then improve again on his next lap but crossed the line just 0.002s down on Ingram’s time, which would ultimately prove to be good enough for his first pole of the year and the first for a Toyota Corolla since 1982.

The top two would actually end the session watching the timing screens in their respective garages but no-one was able to get close to the front row, with Tordoff in third place nearly three-tenths of a second further back in his Cobra Sport AmD-run Civic Type R.

Tom Chilton followed up his strong pace during the two-day Dunlop tyre test with fourth in his Ford Focus, whilst Turkington secured fifth in the first of the BMWs; a strong result given the boost changes and the fact that the rear-wheel drive cars have also undergone centre of gravity changes following the return of the Infiniti Q50 to the grid.

Jason Plato was sixth best in his Vauxhall Astra to maintain the solid performance he had shown in practice, with Andrew Jordan, Matt Neal, Adam Morgan and Rob Collard rounding out the top ten.

Elsewhere amongst the front-runners in the title race, Rory Butcher was just 0.011s behind Collard in eleventh, with Ash Sutton’s Subaru and Josh Cook’s Honda down in 18th and 19th positions.

Aside from Jelley, there were issues for Matt Simpson, who ended the session parked on the side of the circuit after an issue with his Honda, whilst Jack Goff was 21st having lost all of his times mid-way through the session when his VW CC failed the ride height test.