Ash Sutton reaping the rewards of winter work

Ash Sutton said he was reaping the reward of Laser Tools Racing’s winter work after extending his lead in the BTCC standings at Thruxton.

The defending champion was able to move 30 points clear of Tom Ingram over the course of the weekend after following up a solid fifth place with maximum ballast in race one, with a fourth victory of the campaign in race two.

Although unable to break into the top ten in race three, Sutton was still able to outscore Ingram in two of the three races and praised his team for the work that had gone in to making the Infiniti a more consistent package at the front.

“We’ve extended the lead by 16 points so it has been a strong weekend,” he said, “and I’m just a bit gutted with race three as we didn’t manage to get as much from it as I hoped. With the ballast onboard you need the momentum that we didn’t have with the race being so stop/start and it was hard work, but we scored some points to add to the earlier races.

“Our winter testing has been key to us unlocking the potential in the car and now we are performing each weekend without the ups and downs we had last year. The car is in a much better place going to Croft although the resurfacing work there means it isn’t as dominant towards rear wheel drive as it has been. That means we need to work hard to maintain our progress.”