TOM Ingram stormed into a 21-point lead in the British Touring Car Championship (BTCC) drivers’ standings following a double podium at Croft driving for Team Bristol Street Motors.
Ingram finished second in race one and third in race three, either side of a fourth place finish in race two, to move top of the drivers’ standings.
Driving for Droitwich-based Team Bristol Street Motors, Ingram has now secured nine podium finishes this season while teammate Tom Chilton claimed the race win in race three.
Ingram said: “It was a hell of a weekend – fast and frenetic throughout. I knew we’d be really strong from a chassis perspective at Croft, but at the same time, I was conscious of the hybrid situation and with the allocation we had, I genuinely didn’t expect to be fighting for the front two rows of the grid.
“I think we over-performed in that respect, and while Q3 wasn’t quite perfect, I was very pleased to line up third.
“I didn’t need a second invitation to fill the gap Dan [Cammish] left open for me on the first lap in race one, and after that, I tried to match Colin [Turkington] but at a certain point, I had to admit defeat, knowing he had more hybrid available than I did.
“I was also mindful of needing to be a bit careful on the soft tyres in the hot conditions so I pushed for as long as I could until Colin began to deploy his hybrid, and let’s be honest, he was never going to make a mistake – it’s not for nothing that he’s nicknamed the ‘King of Croft’.
“We knew it would be tricky on the hard tyre in race two; we won that particular battle, which was great, but as soon as the guys on the softs came up behind, it made sense to let them past so they could just get on with it.
“In that scenario, you don’t want to trip over people, especially when we had a gap back to everybody else on hards. Discretion was definitely the better part of valour; there was little point in fighting too hard or taking any risks when the soft tyre was clearly much quicker.
“Race three was then fantastic for the whole team, and I was so, so pleased for Tom [Chilton – team-mate] – he had the pace all weekend and he drove fantastically. The Hyundai felt phenomenal again – really alive and an absolute joy to drive – and knowing we’re in such a great window with it obviously gives me a lot of confidence.
“The BTCC is so incredibly competitive that we’ve got to make sure we perform every single time, but that’s a kind of pressure I enjoy, so we’ll keep our heads down, keep focussing on ourselves, keep doing the job we need to do and keep ticking the race weekends off.
“There’s still a long way to go and of course there’s always more we can extract, but we’re in a happy place and the car seems to be working well everywhere. Hybrid will likely be very significant at Knockhill, but I think we’ll be strong there nevertheless – so the target has to be more of the same.”
Ingram now has 253 points and holds a 21-point lead over closest rival Jake Hill (232) with Ash Sutton (224) and Dan Cammish (212) both in contention.
Team Bristol Street Motors sit second in the teams standings on 386 points behind leaders NAPA Racing UK (446).
The BTCC continues at Knockhill over the weekend of August 10 to 11.
