Tom Ingram grabs early championship lead with near-perfect weekend

Tom Ingram has shared his delight after claiming the early lead in the British Touring Car Championship standings following a near-perfect weekend at Donington Park.

The Team BRISTOL STREET Motors driver was the man to beat on Saturday as he topped both practice sessions and qualifying, and he duly carried that form into race day.

Claiming a comfortable lights-to-flag victory in a damp opening contest, the Hyundai i30N driver then repeated the feat in race two after making a late move to wrestle the lead from Jake Hill.

The 2022 champion capped off his weekend at the Leicestershire venue with another fine drive in race three as he muscled his front-wheel-drive machine up to fourth place, despite having significantly less hybrid deployment than those ahead of him.

As a result of Ingram’s superlative start to the new campaign, he now heads to Brands Hatch in less than two weeks’ time sitting at the top of the standings with a nine-point advantage over Ash Sutton.

“That certainly defines what I’d call a ‘pointsy weekend,” said Ingram. “We’ve topped practice, taken pole, converted that into a win with the fastest lap, then won race two and then finished with a fourth – and that could very well have been third – with another fastest lap.

“It’s a stonking amount of points and I can’t be disappointed at all. What does excite even more than that though is the speed of that car now because it feels stupendously good and I can’t wait to get to the next round already.

“Winning race one was mega and I think winning race two came as a little bit of a surprise because Jake made a small mistake. What we’ve seen though is the hybrid deployment counts for a lot round here so it is going to be interesting to see how it effects things going forward.”