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Marcus Simmons

BTCC Silverstone: Morgan heads BMW 1-2-3 in practice

Morgan has been on form all day aboard his Ciceley Motorsport BMW 330e M Sport – he was a pacesetter in the opening session before a trackrod bracket became detached from the rear frame.

Tom Ingram ended up supreme in that early running, his Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N recording no fewer than four laps quicker than the best anyone else could manage, and ending up atop the order by 0.104 seconds.

Times came down in the later session – albeit not for Ingram – and it was Morgan who led a BMW 1-2-3.

A late improvement from Stephen Jelley hoisted his West Surrey Racing-machine into second position, 0.014s adrift of Morgan, while the second Ciceley BMW of BTCC rookie George Gamble was third.

“Coming here, we made some changes to the front end of the car and it just seems to have gelled,” said Morgan.

“Whether it’ll work everywhere I don’t know, but this is a relatively high-grip circuit. It’s always nice when you push a car out at a track and it seems to work, and this is one of those days.

“It’s given me a lot of confidence to push on, and even in FP1 when the tyres were 100km-plus old the balance was good.”

Stephen Jelley, Team BMW BMW 330e M Sport (Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images)

Ingram’s early-morning best was good for fourth overall across the two sessions on a circuit where he always shines, but he was down in 14th spot in the later period.

Instead, the front-wheel-drive opposition to the BMW armada became the Speedworks Motorsport Toyota Corollas, which had survived a tricky opening session.

Ricky Collard was second in that period, then fourth later on to go fifth overall. It’s been an impressive day for the BTCC rookie, but he ended the first session in a red-flag-inducing clash with Team Hard Cupra driver Will Powell on the approach to Becketts, which also caught out Dexter Patterson, who had to take his Infiniti off track to avoid the opaque cloud of tyre smoke.

Collard alighted from the Toyota and stalked straight over to the Cupra to remonstrate furiously with Powell, but continued on good form in the second session.

Team-mate Rory Butcher, meanwhile, was fourth, before going sixth later on to end up seventh overall.

In between the two Toyotas was the second WSR BMW of Jake Hill, with the third of the WSR squad, championship leader Colin Turkington, immediately behind in eighth overall.

Jason Plato was quick early on to go third fastest in his BTC Racing Honda Civic Type R, the time standing for ninth overall, while Bobby Thompson (Team Hard Cupra) completed the top 10.

Apart from Turkington, Hill and Ingram, the other member of the main title-contending quartet, Ash Sutton, was a lowly 18th in FP1 in his Motorbase Performance-run Ford Focus, and slipped even further to 23rd later on.

BTCC Silverstone FP1 result:

Cla Driver Time Gap Interval
1 United Kingdom Tom Ingram 57.675    
2 United Kingdom Ricky Collard 57.779 0.104 0.104
3 United Kingdom Jason Plato 57.799 0.124 0.020
4 United Kingdom Rory Butcher 57.801 0.126 0.002
5 United Kingdom Colin Turkington 57.857 0.182 0.056
6 United Kingdom Adam Morgan 57.871 0.196 0.014
7 United Kingdom Gordon Shedden 57.890 0.215 0.019
8 United Kingdom Daniel Lloyd 57.959 0.284 0.069
9 Ireland Aron Taylor-Smith 57.964 0.289 0.005
10 United Kingdom Jake Hill 57.966 0.291 0.002
11 United Kingdom Dan Cammish 57.986 0.311 0.020
12 United Kingdom Ash Hand 58.013 0.338 0.027
13 United Kingdom Tom Chilton 58.032 0.357 0.019
14 Bobby Thompson 58.039 0.364 0.007
15 George Gamble 58.042 0.367 0.003
16 United Kingdom Daniel Rowbottom 58.082 0.407 0.040
17 United Kingdom Aiden Moffat 58.085 0.410 0.003
18 United Kingdom Ashley Sutton 58.113 0.438 0.028
19 United Kingdom Stephen Jelley 58.120 0.445 0.007
20 United Kingdom Josh Cook 58.160 0.485 0.040
21 Michael Crees 58.244 0.569 0.084
22 Nicolas Hamilton 58.434 0.759 0.190
23 Dexter Patterson 58.503 0.828 0.069
24 Jade Edwards 58.542 0.867 0.039
25 Jersey Jack Butel 58.684 1.009 0.142
26 United Kingdom Ollie Jackson 58.857 1.182 0.173
27 United Kingdom Sam Osborne 58.860 1.185 0.003
28 Rick Parfitt Jr. 59.525 1.850 0.665
29 Will Powell      

BTCC Silverstone FP2 result:

Cla Driver Time Gap Interval
1 United Kingdom Adam Morgan 57.601    
2 United Kingdom Stephen Jelley 57.615 0.014 0.014
3 George Gamble 57.648 0.047 0.033
4 United Kingdom Ricky Collard 57.681 0.080 0.033
5 United Kingdom Jake Hill 57.747 0.146 0.066
6 United Kingdom Rory Butcher 57.768 0.167 0.021
7 United Kingdom Colin Turkington 57.792 0.191 0.024
8 Bobby Thompson 57.841 0.240 0.049
9 United Kingdom Gordon Shedden 57.882 0.281 0.041
10 United Kingdom Aiden Moffat 57.899 0.298 0.017
11 United Kingdom Ash Hand 57.911 0.310 0.012
12 United Kingdom Daniel Rowbottom 57.965 0.364 0.054
13 United Kingdom Daniel Lloyd 57.972 0.371 0.007
14 United Kingdom Tom Ingram 57.993 0.392 0.021
15 United Kingdom Tom Chilton 58.017 0.416 0.024
16 United Kingdom Jason Plato 58.096 0.495 0.079
17 United Kingdom Dan Cammish 58.107 0.506 0.011
18 Michael Crees 58.120 0.519 0.013
19 United Kingdom Josh Cook 58.150 0.549 0.030
20 Dexter Patterson 58.168 0.567 0.018
21 Ireland Aron Taylor-Smith 58.175 0.574 0.007
22 Jersey Jack Butel 58.356 0.755 0.181
23 United Kingdom Ashley Sutton 58.368 0.767 0.012
24 United Kingdom Ollie Jackson 58.423 0.822 0.055
25 Nicolas Hamilton 58.427 0.826 0.004
26 United Kingdom Sam Osborne 58.740 1.139 0.313
27 Rick Parfitt Jr. 59.786 2.185 1.046
28 Jade Edwards      
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