Aiden Moffat tops the times in practice at Oulton Park
Power Maxed Racing’s Aiden Moffat set the pace in the sole practice session for the British Touring Car Championship at Oulton Park, a tenth of a second ahead of EXCELR8’s Tom Chilton.
In drying conditions, the Audi A3 Saloon driver set a best time of 1:24:213s around the 2.26-mile Cheshire circuit to lead the 20-car field into this afternoon’s Qualifying session and subsequent Qualifying Race.
The Hyundai of Chilton emerged as the closest challenger to xx, moving up to second in the latter stages of the session, whilst Restart Racing’s Chris Smiley completed the top three in his Hyundai.
Next up was the second Power Maxed Racing Audi of Mikey Doble in fourth place, fractionally ahead of championship leader Ash Sutton and Jack Sears Trophy leader James Dorlin, who were fifth and sixth respectively.
Seventh was Alliance Racing’s Dan Cammish, with Dexter Patterson, reigning champion Tom Ingram and Daryl De Leon ending the 40-minute session hot on his heels and inside the top ten.
The only driver not to take part in the session was Speedworks Corolla Racing’s Max Buxton, who has been ruled out of Saturday’s track action due to a viral infection.
Qualifying is scheduled to get underway at 14:00 with the grid splitting into two groups, each of which will be allotted 15 minutes for drivers to set their best time, which will in-turn decide the grid for the inaugural Qualifying Race.
The group with the fastest qualifying time will occupy the odd-numbered grid positions for the Qualifying Race, ordered by their respective qualifying times. The other group will occupy the even-numbered grid positions, also ordered by qualifying times.
Once qualifying has completed, the pit lane will open and cars will head to the grid for what is being titled as the ‘Race for Pole’. There, a 10-lap race will ensue to decide the grid for Sunday’s opener, with half points on offer too.
