Colin Turkington claimed his second successive British Touring Car Championship qualifying pole position for the seventh round of the series at Knockhill.
The four-time champion faced a stern challenge from an unlikely opponent in the form of Aron Taylor-Smith, but the Power Maxed Racing Vauxhall Astra pilot could not quite dislodge the West Surrey Racing-run BMW 330e M Sport from the top of the times, and Turkington held on by 0.035 seconds for his 30th career BTCC pole.
While the Irish duo battled it out for pole, the entire top four in the championship fell at the earlier qualifying hurdles on a circuit where the lack of hybrid power boost allowed to the leading drivers in the points has a more significant effect than almost any other – Jake Hill, Ash Sutton and Dan Cammish all failed to make it out of Q2, while Tom Ingram could not even get through the first phase.
Turkington, who had 11 seconds of hybrid per lap, set his standard relatively early in Q3. While the County Armagh man locked his right-front tyre at Duffus Dip trying to go quicker still, Taylor-Smith – on 13s of hybrid – inched closer and closer.
The cheerful Dublin veteran set a lap just 0.057s off Turkington’s best, before his next brought the gap down further.
“It felt really good,” said Turkington, who was fastest in all three phases of qualifying. “Qualfying’s the first time you put new rubber on, and I think we just got it right today.
“You go into these qualifying sessions and you just hope to make it out of Q1 – you just don’t know where the pace is going to be.
“My car was really hooked up, and we just chipped away through each session. There’s not much left in the car.”
Dan Rowbottom did a lap that was good enough for third only to have that taken away for track limits, meaning Adam Morgan’s best was good enough to make it two WSR BMWs in the top three.
Rowbottom endured a tense Q1 in his Alliance Racing-run NAPA Ford Focus ST – he was outside the top-six cut-off when a brief flurry of rain appeared to hammer his hopes, but he put everything on the line to scrape through on his final lap, and squeaked through Q2 on the bubble in sixth.
Rowbottom ended Q3 in fourth place, like Morgan on the full 15s of hybrid allowance.
Josh Cook, on nine seconds of hybrid, was fifth in his Speedworks Motorsport-run LKQ Toyota Corolla GR Sport, with stablemate Andrew Watson rounding out the Quick Six pole shootout – Watson had no fewer than four of his five quick laps deleted for track limits.
Despite a broken wishbone preventing him from completing any quick laps in free practice, Hill (3s of hybrid) was the best-placed of the championship top four in qualifying – he will start seventh in his WSR BMW after being bumped out of Q3 late on by team-mate Morgan.
Dan Cammish (7s hybrid) starts his Alliance Ford alongside Hill on row four, ahead of Tom Chilton’s Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N Fastback and Mikey Doble’s PMR Vauxhall.
Daryl DeLeon starred to get his Unlimited Motorsport Cupra Leon through Q1, despite a stunt driver-esque two-wheeled trip into the gravel at the chicane and set a time good enough for ninth in Q2, but track limits relegated him to 11th.
That was still better than reigning champion Sutton, who on 5s of hybrid propped up the Q2 times in his Alliance Ford, and was mystified to go slower on new tyres than he had on old rubber in free practice.
Ingram missed out on progressing from Q1 by just 0.024s and will line his Excelr8 Hyundai up 15th, saying “the car actually felt fantastic” and attributing his poor result entirely to his one second per lap of hybrid.
BTCC Knockhill - Q3 results
| Cla | Driver | # | Car | Laps | Time | Interval | km/h | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 |  C. Turkington Team BMW |
20 | BMW 330e M Sport | 11 |
50.862 |
89.671 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 2 |  A. Taylor-Smith Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing |
40 | Vauxhall Astra | 10 |
+0.035 50.897 |
0.035 | 89.609 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 3 | A. Morgan Team BMW |
33 | BMW 330e M Sport | 11 |
+0.120 50.982 |
0.085 | 89.460 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 4 | D. Rowbottom NAPA Racing UK |
32 | Ford Focus ST | 11 |
+0.183 51.045 |
0.063 | 89.349 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 5 | J. Cook LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ |
66 | Toyota Corolla GR Sport | 11 |
+0.212 51.074 |
0.029 | 89.299 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 6 | A. Watson Toyota Gazoo Racing UK |
11 | Toyota Corolla GR Sport | 10 |
+0.291 51.153 |
0.079 | 89.161 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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