Colin Turkington cruised to his 70th career British Touring Car Championship race victory with a dominant lights-to-flag drive at Croft. The four-time champion started his West Surrey Racing-run BMW 330e M Sport from pole position, and got a good launch. Tom Ingram quickly got past front-row starter Dan Cammish on the opening lap and looked to be a threat to Turkington over the first few miles.
But, once the rear-wheel-drive BMW’s tyres were switched on, Turkington was able to extend an advantage, set fastest lap, and maintain the gap to the pursuing Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N Fastback of Ingram, who was 1.746 seconds adrift at the chequered flag. “We’ve obviously had the pace this weekend – we showed that yesterday,” said Turkington, for whom this was the 15th BTCC race win at Croft.
“Having the luxury of a few extra laps of hybrid [over Ingram] made the job easier. The car was good. Tom had the pace over the opening laps, but I felt I had enough in hand.
“Once I got the front tyres in, I knew I was in a good place.” “Colin was never going to make a mistake,” said Ingram. “He’s the king of Croft and world-class.
” Ingram had got up the inside of Cammish into the second corner at Hawthorns on the opening lap. The Alliance Racing-run NAPA Ford Focus ST of Cammish then skipped the chicane and conceded the position to Ingram on the run into Tower. The sister Alliance Ford of Ash Sutton got past Aron Taylor-Smith ’s Power Maxed Racing Vauxhall Astra on the second lap for fourth position.
Sutton then closed the gap to Cammish and they were together with four laps remaining, but the Berkshire-domiciled Yorkshire native had enough in hand to hang onto the final podium position at his local circuit. Taylor-Smith kept a constant fifth for the rest of the race, with Jake Hill carving his WSR BMW from 11th on the grid to sixth during the first few laps. Hill, like the quintet ahead, was running the soft-compound Goodyear tyre in this race, and his result means that he has been leapfrogged by Ingram for the championship lead.
Rob Huff raised some eyebrows when, from fifth on the grid, he elected to take the pain of running the hard tyre in this race on his Speedworks Motorsport-run Toyota Corolla GR Sport. He then raised more eyebrows by clinging onto sixth ahead of Hill until the hairpin on the fifth lap, and such was his pace after this that he was closer to the soft-tyred Hill ahead than the hard-rubbered pursuers behind. Huff will be using the soft tyres in race two, which the top six from the opener must all start on the hard rubber.
In a largely processional race, there was some semblance of action in the group behind, with the Speedworks-run LKQ Toyota of Josh Cook hanging onto eighth ahead of Tom Chilton ’s Excelr8 Hyundai and Dan Rowbottom’s Alliance Ford. All were on the hard tyres, so will be soft-shod in race two. Chris Smiley had been in this gaggle until the Restart Racing Cupra Leon speared off the road at Sunny before rejoining.
BTCC Croft Race One Result.
