Race report
BTCC Thruxton
BTCC Thruxton: Sutton claims yet another win in race two
Ash Sutton extended his British Touring Car Championship lead by claiming his sixth win from the past seven races in the second stanza at Thruxton.
Marcus Simmons
Edited: Jun 5, 2023, 1:22 PM
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Once again, the three-time champion led from start to finish in his Motorbase Performance-run Ford Focus ST in another processional race at the front.
As in the first race, reigning title holder Tom Ingram held second position throughout at the wheel of his Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N.
Just as earlier, Ingram had some threat from Josh Cook’s One Motorsport Honda Civic Type R – in yet another repeat of race one, this was after shrugging off a challenge over the first half a lap from Jake Hill’s West Surrey Racing-run BMW 330e M Sport.
There were some small differences from the opening race though. This time it was Sutton, not Cook, who set the fastest lap – and, astonishingly, it was more than a second quicker than anyone else’s best.
This time, the dominant winner did let Ingram get closer – although the Ford was 2.6 seconds in front by the end of the opening lap, the Hyundai trimmed that to just over a second at half-distance, before Sutton pulled away again to win by 2.234s.
“Making history…” said an emotional Sutton. “It’s big, I just can’t thank the team enough.
“The car’s phenomenal and it’s just a joy to drive.”
Ashley Sutton, NAPA Racing UK Ford Focus ST
Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images
Behind Ingram, who had survived an oversteery moment after a tap from Cook at the Complex on the opening lap, which played a small part in Sutton’s escape to victory, Hill appeared to be homing in on Cook during the first few laps.
But the leading BMW fell away as the race wore on and instead had to keep the Motorbase Ford of Dan Cammish at arm’s length during the closing stages for fourth.
Rory Butcher had a good first lap in his Speedworks Motorsport Toyota Corolla to get ahead of Cammish straight away and then pass Colin Turkington’s WSR BMW at Noble, the four-time champion ceding a further place to Cammish when this sent him wide.
But Cammish passed Butcher for fifth on the sixth lap of 16, and then Turkington closed on the Toyota.
Butcher was out of hybrid with a couple of laps to go, and Turkington got ahead of him on the penultimate tour for sixth, with Aron Taylor-Smith’s Power Maxed Racing Vauxhall Astra right on the Scotsman’s rear bumper by the finish.
The top 10 was completed by Ricky Collard’s Speedworks Toyota and the One Honda of Aiden Moffat.
Dan Rowbottom fought his Motorbase Ford through from the back of the grid to 11th by passing Adam Morgan’s WSR BMW at Segrave on the final lap – a move the bearded Midlander may regret, because Sutton’s first mistake of the weekend came post-race when he pulled number ‘12’ out of the reversed-grid draw, putting Morgan on pole for the finale.
To rub salt into the wound, Rowbottom was subsequently given a three-place grid penalty for an incident with Ronan Pearson, relegating his Ford to fifth in the starting line-up and elevating Moffat to the front row.
BTCC Thruxton race two results
Cla Driver Gap Interval 1 Ashley Sutton 2
Tom Ingram 2.234 2.234 3
Josh Cook 6.330 4.096 4
Jake Hill 8.730 2.400 5
Dan Cammish 9.580 0.850 6
Colin Turkington 15.734 6.154 7
Rory Butcher 17.003 1.269 8
Aron Taylor-Smith 17.411 0.408 9
Ricky Collard 19.834 2.423 10
Aiden Moffat 23.723 3.889 11
Daniel Rowbottom 24.012 0.289 12
Adam Morgan 24.743 0.731 13
Tom Chilton 25.348 0.605 14 Mikey Doble 29.666 4.318 15 Dexter Patterson 30.737 1.071 16
Andrew Watson 31.039 0.302 17
Stephen Jelley 34.943 3.904 18
Sam Osborne 35.490 0.547 19 Ronan Pearson 35.758 0.268 20 Jack Butel 40.852 5.094 21
Daniel Lloyd 44.785 3.933 22 Nicolas Hamilton 56.787 12.002 23 Nick Halstead 1'03.640 6.853 Jade Edwards Bobby Thompson George Gamble Will Powell View full results
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