Team BMW driver Colin Turkington enjoyed one of the best weekends of his illustrious BTCC career as a double victory at Snetterton vaulted him back to the summit of the standings.
The Northern Irishman grabbed pole position in the all-new ‘Top Ten Showdown’ on Saturday afternoon and duly converted that into two commanding wins on race day.
Turkington followed that up with a podium in the final bout as Rory Butcher and Tom Ingram clashed, impacting on their respective championship challenges.
Motorbase Performance’s Ollie Jackson grabbed a second career BTCC victory in the reverse-grid race, following on from his maiden success at Silverstone last month.
The morning action commenced with Turkington securing a lights-to-flag victory despite the early attentions of Toyota Gazoo Racing UK rival Ingram.
Turkington’s 3 Series blasted away from the line with what looked to be one of the best launches of the season so far as Ingram breezed by the sluggish-starting MB Motorsport Honda Civic Type R of Jake Hill.
Ingram’s Toyota Corolla went side-by-side with the #1 machine around the outside at Agostini on lap one, but Turkington cleverly squeezed Ingram on the exit of the turn, bringing Hill back into the battle. Hill scythed by Ingram but then ran wide through the next left-hander at Hamilton and Ingram was back into second.
It wasn’t the last time that the pair would switch positions as Turkington set about scampering away from the fight. Hill made a committed move on Ingram in the latter stages at Wilson and Ingram’s Toyota was tipped into a half-spin. That allowed Hill through, but the MB Motorsport man subsequently chose to relinquish the position.
So Turkington, Ingram and Hill were confirmed in the podium positions but there was another scrapping trio behind them, with Butcher eventually getting the better of two of his fellow title contenders – Laser Tools Racing’s Ash Sutton and Halfords Yuasa Racing’s Dan Cammish.
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