Race report

BTCC Croft

Croft BTCC: Turkington cruises to victory in Race 3

Four-time British Touring Car champion Colin Turkington added to his reputation as the ‘King of Croft’ by scoring his 13th BTCC win at the North Yorkshire circuit in the third race of the day.

Marcus Simmons

Edited: Sep 20, 2021, 8:57 AM

Copy link

Share on Viber

Add as a preferred source

Colin Turkington, Team BMW BMW 330i M Sport

Turkington, who was drawn on reversed-grid pole position, got the jump on front-row partner Gordon Shedden off the line, and never looked back.

Turkington’s West Surrey Racing-run BMW 330i M Sport was carrying 27kg of success ballast compared to the 33kg of Shedden’s Team Dynamics Honda Civic Type R.

Once again, the race was neutralised by an early safety car to recover the stranded machines of Dan Lloyd and Jack Mitchell, victims of a multi-car first-corner tangle, but Turkington made a perfect restart, crossing the line 0.790 seconds in front of Shedden already.

Shedden kept Turkington honest for a few laps, before the Northern Irishman pulled the gap beyond a second by the seventh lap of 16.

Three laps later it was over three seconds, and Turkington finished 3.5s to the good, jumping up to third in the championship.

“It felt much like Thruxton [scene of the previous round] the way my day improved,” said Turkington.

“I had to battle really hard today, but that’s the way it goes – P7 in race two put me on pole and we converted it, so I’m really proud of the team for that.”

As Shedden fell back, he came under attack from the Laser Tools Racing Infiniti Q50 of championship leader Ash Sutton, on 39kg of ballast.

Sutton constantly sought an opening, especially in the final complex and hairpin, but had a buckled right-front wheel from striking the kerb at the first corner while fending off Tom Ingram and Josh Cook.

Two-time champion Sutton was reluctant to try a risky move with his Infiniti in that state, but completed the day with a podium and is 29 points ahead of new series runner-up Jake Hill going into the final three rounds.

Ingram, who has fallen from second to fifth in the standings after the Croft races, claimed fourth position in his Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N.

A right-front puncture on the Hyundai hobbled Ingram over the last couple of laps, but he had just enough air pressure left to fend off the fast-closing Josh Cook’s BTC Racing Honda.

Aiden Moffat completed his best weekend yet in the BTCC, claiming sixth in his LTR Infiniti to add to his win and second place from earlier in the day.

Hill fell away from Moffat, who like him was running the soft option tyre in this race.

The Motorbase-run MB Motorsport Ford Focus has struggled on the soft Goodyear this season and this, combined with 75kg on board, meant that Hill was happy to rescue seventh place after a win and a second in the first two races.

Hill’s pace deficit meant he came under attack from Adam Morgan’s Ciceley Motorsport BMW: on the sixth lap the Ford got sideways into the complex and was inadvertently nerfed by Morgan; then, as Hill gathered up the moment, a flick of accidental contact sent Morgan off the road and into a spin.

Senna Proctor then took up the challenge, but couldn’t find a way past Hill and claimed eighth in his BTC Honda, ahead of Dan Rowbottom’s Dynamics Honda and Tom Chilton’s Ciceley BMW.

Rory Butcher made good progress from the back of the grid to finish 11th in his Speedworks Motorsport-run Toyota Corolla.

Croft BTCC Race 3 results:

Cla Driver Gap 1 United Kingdom Colin Turkington 2 Gordon Shedden 3.500 3 Ashley Sutton 3.716 4 Tom Ingram 7.282 5 Josh Cook 7.896 6 Aiden Moffat 16.730 7 Jake Hill 18.360 8 Senna Proctor 18.979 9 Daniel Rowbottom 20.363 10 Tom Chilton 20.810 11 Rory Butcher 21.279 12 Ireland Aron Taylor-Smith 22.409 13 United Kingdom Tom Oliphant 22.600 14 Stephen Jelley 23.383 15 Carl Boardley 26.709 16 Sam Smelt 34.310 17 Adam Morgan 34.872 18 Andy Neate 36.467 19 Jack Butel 36.939 20 Nicolas Hamilton 45.435 21 Nick Halstead 1 Lap 22 Sam Osborne 1 Lap 23 Jason Plato 1 Lap Chris Smiley 11 Laps Ollie Jackson 15 Laps Jade Edwards 15 Laps United Kingdom Jack Goff 15 Laps Daniel Lloyd Jack Mitchell Jr. View full results

We want your opinion!

What would you like to see on Motorsport.com?

Take our 5 minute survey.

- The Motorsport.com Team

Read and post comments

Share Or Save This Story

Copy link

Share on Viber

Previous article 'Disappointed' Almirola among the four eliminated from playoffs

Next article Indy Lights Laguna Seca: Kirkwood dominates again for ninth win

Top Comments

There are no comments at the moment. Would you like to write one?

View More & Comment

Latest news

TV ratings released for NASCAR Cup season finale

NASCAR Cup

NAS NASCAR Cup

Homestead-Miami

4 h

TV ratings released for NASCAR Cup season finale

Chase Elliott's car chief leaves Hendrick for NASCAR Truck crew chief role

NASCAR Truck

NSTR NASCAR Truck

Homestead

5 h

Chase Elliott's car chief leaves Hendrick for NASCAR Truck crew chief role

The surprising convergence behind F1's increasingly competitive 2026 season

Formula 1

The surprising convergence behind F1's increasingly competitive 2026 season

“I was getting beat up” – How Daniel Ricciardo burned out on ‘humiliating’ F1 return

Formula 1

F1 Formula 1 9 h

“I was getting beat up” – How Daniel Ricciardo burned out on ‘humiliating’ F1 return

Subscribe and access Motorsport.com with your ad-blocker.

From Formula 1 to MotoGP we report straight from the paddock because we love our sport, just like you. In order to keep delivering our expert journalism, our website uses advertising. Still, we want to give you the opportunity to enjoy an ad-free and tracker-free website and to continue using your adblocker.

You have 2 options:

Become a subscriber.
Disable your adblocker.

Subscribe now Already subscribed? Sign in here

Already disabled your adblocker?
Reload page

Manage Alerts