BTCC Croft: Cook fastest in practice from Ingram

Josh Cook topped free practice as the British Touring Car Championship resumed at Croft following its five-week summer break.

The red-headed West Countryman appeared to reap the dividend of mid-season development work carried out by the Speedworks Motorsport squad on his LKQ Toyota Corolla GR Sport, although was realistic that free practice is one thing, qualifying and racing quite another.

Cook dipped below the FP1-topping time set by Tom Ingram going into the final quarter of an hour of FP2, and then went 0.017 seconds quicker still on his following lap.

That put Cook 0.122s quicker than the Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N Fastback of Ingram on combined times across the two sessions, and 0.212s better than Ingram’s team-mate Tom Chilton in the FP2 order.

Any further hope of quick times was promptly doused – literally – by a heavy rain shower that rendered the final 10 minutes of FP2 a washout, although some did venture out to get a read on wet-weather conditions.

“P1 is good, and the car felt a bit wild, but I knew there was something good in there,” Cook told Autosport.

“I knew that if we could nudge it in the direction we wanted, it would be comparable to the others, but with this weather the track is going to be green again as we head into qualifying.

“We did some development over the summer break, which was good because we really needed it. Everything seems to have been positive, but we won’t know for sure until we’ve done a few races.”

Tom Ingram, Bristol Street Motors Hyundai i30 N Fastback

Excelr8 looks strong this weekend, with Ingram’s FP1 best good for second overall, while he also set the third best time in FP2 behind Chilton to complete a 2-3 in that session for the Hyundais.

Second quickest in FP1, with a time good enough for fourth overall across the two sessions, was the West Surrey Racing BMW 330e M Sport of 14-time Croft BTCC race winner Colin Turkington.

Backing up Turkington in a strong showing for the Northern Irish contingent was Chris Smiley, who looked at his spectacular best in the lead Restart Racing Cupra Leon on his way to fourth in FP2, fifth overall.

That put him just ahead of Dan Rowbottom, who set the quickest time for the squadron of Alliance Racing-run NAPA Ford Focus STs.

Seventh across the two sessions was Rob Huff in his Speedworks-run Toyota Gazoo Racing GB Corolla, while four-time champion Ash Sutton was eighth in his NAPA Ford ahead of the WSR BMW of championship leader Jake Hill.

Rounding out the top 10 overall across the morning was Adam Morgan’s WSR BMW.

With the alternate positions from FP2 deciding the qualifying groups, it leaves the entire top three in the championship of Hill, Ingram and Sutton running together in the opening session for the first phase.

BTCC Croft - Practice results

FP2

Main Information Additional Data Driver Info

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Main Information
Cla	Driver	#		Car	Laps	Time	Interval	km/h
1	J. Cook LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	66		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	13	1'21.784		92.443
2	T. Chilton Team Bristol Street Motors	3		Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance	11	+0.212 1'21.996	0.212	92.204
3	T. Ingram Team Bristol Street Motors	80		Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance	14	+0.375 1'22.159	0.163	92.021
4	C. Smiley Restart Racing	222		Cupra León	13	+0.404 1'22.188	0.029	91.989
5	D. Rowbottom NAPA Racing UK	32		Ford Focus ST	13	+0.412 1'22.196	0.008	91.980
6	C. Turkington Team BMW	20		BMW 330e M Sport	15	+0.426 1'22.210	0.014	91.964
7	R. Huff Toyota Gazoo Racing UK	12		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	16	+0.491 1'22.275	0.065	91.891
8	A. Morgan Team BMW	33		BMW 330e M Sport	13	+0.749 1'22.533	0.258	91.604
9	J. Hill Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	24		BMW 330e M Sport	17	+0.749 1'22.533	0.000	91.604
10	A. Watson Toyota Gazoo Racing UK	11		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	14	+0.834 1'22.618	0.085	91.510
11	A. Sutton NAPA Racing UK	1		Ford Focus ST	17	+0.849 1'22.633	0.015	91.493
12	A. Taylor-Smith Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	40		Vauxhall Astra	12	+0.849 1'22.633	0.000	91.493
13	M. Doble Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	88		Vauxhall Astra	13	+0.855 1'22.639	0.006	91.487
14	R. Pearson Team Bristol Street Motors	14		Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance	11	+0.900 1'22.684	0.045	91.437
15	A. Moffat LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	16		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	15	+0.979 1'22.763	0.079	91.350
16	D. Cammish NAPA Racing UK	27		Ford Focus ST	14	+1.099 1'22.883	0.120	91.217
17	D. De Duckhams Racing with Bartercard	18		Cupra León	13	+1.148 1'22.932	0.049	91.163
18	S. Sumpton Restart Racing	29		Cupra León	13	+1.915 1'23.699	0.767	90.328
19	N. Halstead Team Bristol Street Motors	22		Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance	14	+3.854 1'25.638	1.939	88.283
20	S. Osborne NAPA Racing UK	77		Ford Focus ST	14	+4.141 1'25.925	0.287	87.988
View full results

FP1

Main Information Additional Data Driver Info

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Main Information
Cla	Driver	#		Car	Laps	Time	Interval	km/h
1	T. Ingram Team Bristol Street Motors	80		Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance	16	1'21.906		92.305
2	C. Turkington Team BMW	20		BMW 330e M Sport	19	+0.158 1'22.064	0.158	92.128
3	A. Taylor-Smith Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	40		Vauxhall Astra	16	+0.374 1'22.280	0.216	91.886
4	R. Huff Toyota Gazoo Racing UK	12		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	18	+0.394 1'22.300	0.020	91.863
5	A. Sutton NAPA Racing UK	1		Ford Focus ST	16	+0.398 1'22.304	0.004	91.859
6	J. Hill Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	24		BMW 330e M Sport	19	+0.405 1'22.311	0.007	91.851
7	J. Cook LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	66		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	14	+0.426 1'22.332	0.021	91.828
8	D. Rowbottom NAPA Racing UK	32		Ford Focus ST	17	+0.457 1'22.363	0.031	91.793
9	T. Chilton Team Bristol Street Motors	3		Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance	15	+0.473 1'22.379	0.016	91.775
10	A. Morgan Team BMW	33		BMW 330e M Sport	16	+0.508 1'22.414	0.035	91.736
11	R. Pearson Team Bristol Street Motors	14		Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance	15	+0.575 1'22.481	0.067	91.662
12	M. Doble Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing	88		Vauxhall Astra	15	+0.727 1'22.633	0.152	91.493
13	D. Cammish NAPA Racing UK	27		Ford Focus ST	16	+0.826 1'22.732	0.099	91.384
14	C. Smiley Restart Racing	222		Cupra León	12	+0.965 1'22.871	0.139	91.230
15	A. Watson Toyota Gazoo Racing UK	11		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	16	+1.038 1'22.944	0.073	91.150
16	D. De Duckhams Racing with Bartercard	18		Cupra León	16	+1.338 1'23.244	0.300	90.822
17	A. Moffat LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ	16		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	12	+1.517 1'23.423	0.179	90.627
18	S. Osborne NAPA Racing UK	77		Ford Focus ST	17	+1.532 1'23.438	0.015	90.611
19	S. Sumpton Restart Racing	29		Cupra León	14	+2.411 1'24.317	0.879	89.666
20	N. Halstead Team Bristol Street Motors	22		Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance	16	+4.519 1'26.425	2.108	87.479
View full results