Dan Cammish edges Thruxton pole battle

Dan Cammish grabbed his first pole of the BTCC season after edging out Josh Cook to top the times in qualifying at Thruxton.

Jake Hill set the early pace in the session as the wheel of his WSR-run BMW but it wasn’t long until Cook hit the front – setting a 1:15.339s lap to put his BTC Racing Honda onto provisional pole.

Cook would find himself ahead of the Focus of Cammish after he nipped in front of Hill, with Cammish then improving his time to jump clear of Cook into provisional pole.

Although Cook would improve his time in a bid to retake pole, he would end up 0.017s behind his rival as Cammish grabbed his first pole since Silverstone 2020.

Cook had to therefore settle for second spot as he bids to extend his record-breaking run of success at the fastest circuit on the calendar, with the front row being three-tenths of a second clear of Hill’s BMW in third.

Ash Sutton capped a strong session for Motorbase by going fourth quickest and it could have gone better for the defending champion had he not suffered a wild spin at Church whilst on a potential pole time.

Gordon Shedden’s Honda was fifth quickest ahead of Ash Hand, who continued his strong day with sixth – only 0.063s ahead of team-mate Michael Crees.

Dan Rowbottom, Tom Chilton and Ricky Collard rounded out the top ten.

Championship leader Colin Turkington could only manage the 15th best time after a session that saw him run off track in avoidance of Nic Hamilton’s Cupra, putting him two spots behind Tom Ingram – who had to settle for 13th spot.

Tom Oliphant failed to set a time after brake issues.