Tom Ingram snares first BTCC pole position of the season
Tom Ingram capped off a perfect Saturday at Donington Park to clinch the first pole position of the season in the British Touring Car Championship, just 0.051 ahead of reigning champion Ash Sutton.
Hot on the heels of topping the times in the day’s earlier two practice sessions, the Hyundai i30 N driver produced a flawless lap in the closing stages of a frenetic session to snare his seventh career pole.
Ingram’s triumph was a historic one too as he became the first-ever driver to reign supreme under the new ‘Quick Six’ format; which dished up its fair share of drama throughout.
Dan Cammish and Adam Morgan were surprise early casualties in the opening segment after being caught out by inclement weather before there was drama for Rob Huff, who was not permitted to leave the pit lane due to his car not being on the pit apron within the required time.
With a number of heavy hitters missing from the Top 12, the battle to reach the final portion of qualifying was hotly contested and it culminated in the likes of Aron Taylor-Smith, Josh Cook and Mikey Doble just missing the cut. Q2 saw brief ref flag stoppage following an incident for Sam Osborne at the exit of the Old Hairpin too.
Ingram, Sutton, Jake Hill, Colin Turkington, Ronan Pearson and Andrew Watson progressed into Q3 and following an early run of laps from Turkington, Ingram and Sutton soon came to the fore with the latter punching in a credible lap for provisional pole.
Former champion Ingram wasted no time in responding with his 1:08:099 taking him back to the top and despite his best efforts, Sutton was unable to regain the advantage in his NAPA Racing UK Ford Focus.
Turkington and Hill secured a BMW lock-out for row two while Pearson clinched a career-best qualifying of fifth ahead of Watson. Completing the top ten was Taylor-Smith, Cook, the ever-improving Daryl Deleon and Doble.
