BTCC Brands Hatch: De Leon and Ingram looking strong in free practice

Daryl De Leon put himself into the limelight with the fastest time in free practice for the British Touring Car Championship round at the Brands Hatch Indy Circuit.

The cheerful Anglo-Filipino scored his only BTCC race win to date at this event last season with the West Surrey Racing BMW 330i M Sport team, and enters the weekend with no restrictions on TOCA Turbo Boost after a tough opening round at Donington Park.

So too does reigning champion Tom Ingram, whose Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N Fastback languished seventh in the times but did very little running on the standard soft-compound Goodyear, which the drivers must use in all competitive running bar one race.

De Leon, normally renowned as one of the smoother drivers in the field, had swung around the BTCC’s shortest circuit in 47.365 seconds. He then emerged for a ‘rag it’ run, and suddenly started showing oversteer seldom seen since the days of Sierra RS500s on 20-lap-old tyres – and shaved a fraction off his previous effort with a 47.360s.

Daryl De Leon, WSR

Photo by: JEP

The Power Maxed Racing Audi A3 Saloon team continued its impressive form from Donington, with Dexter Patterson and Mikey Doble – both of whom have varying degrees of TTB restrictions – putting in late runs for second and third respectively.

Fourth and fifth were the leading pair of Alliance Racing-run NAPA Ford Focus Titanium saloons, with Dan Cammish leading Ash Sutton.

As championship leader, Sutton faces Saturday with a 19s-per-lap TTB deficit over those who are not handicapped such as Ingram and De Leon, deployed at a speed 35km/h higher.

If Sutton was running to his prescribed TTB limit, that bodes extremely well for his chances over the weekend.

The top six was completed by the Plato Racing Mercedes A35 Saloon of Dan Rowbottom.

Ingram’s seventh-fastest time was set with a 47.583s, but that was his only flying lap on the soft rubber and scarcely any quicker than his best on the medium Goodyears – a 47.688s, comfortably quicker than anyone else set on that compound.

Next up was Charles Rainford, whose WSR BMW is almost as badly hampered on TTB as Sutton due to his current championship runner-up position, while Chris Smiley’s Restart Racing Hyundai and Adam Morgan’s Plato Mercedes completed the top 10.

The 40 minutes passed by with no stoppages, although Tom Chilton’s Excelr8 Hyundai peeled off the circuit into the back of the pits with 10 minutes remaining with mechanical woes.

FiP

All Stats

 

Cla	Driver	#		Car	Laps	Time	Interval	km/h
1	D. De Leon West Surrey Racing	2		BMW 330i M Sport	33	47.360		91.817
2	D. Patterson Steel Seal with Power Maxed Racing	17		Audi A3 Saloon	24	+0.042 47.402	0.042	91.735
3	M. Doble LKQ Euro Car Parts with Power Maxed Racing	88		Audi A3 Saloon	31	+0.077 47.437	0.035	91.668
4	D. Cammish NAPA Racing UK	27		Ford Focus Titanium	28	+0.134 47.494	0.057	91.558
5	A. Sutton NAPA Racing UK	116		Ford Focus Titanium	28	+0.148 47.508	0.014	91.531
6	D. Rowbottom Cataclean Plato Racing	32		Mercedes A35 Saloon	28	+0.158 47.518	0.010	91.511
7	T. Ingram Team Vertu	80		Hyundai i30N	26	+0.223 47.583	0.065	91.386
8	C. Rainford West Surrey Racing	99		BMW 330i M Sport	31	+0.297 47.657	0.074	91.245
9	C. Smiley Restart Racing	22		Hyundai i30N	29	+0.341 47.701	0.044	91.160
10	A. Morgan Cataclean Plato Racing	33		Mercedes A35 Saloon	25	+0.357 47.717	0.016	91.130
11	L. Selby NAPA Racing UK	15		Ford Focus Titanium	35	+0.398 47.758	0.041	91.052
12	A. Taylor-Smith Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	50		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	30	+0.482 47.842	0.084	90.892
13	A. Moffat LKQ Euro Car Parts with Power Maxed Racing	16		Audi A3 Saloon	25	+0.661 48.021	0.179	90.553
14	R. Collard Team Vertu	11		Hyundai i30N	24	+0.698 48.058	0.037	90.483
15	T. Chilton Team Vertu	3		Hyundai i30N	19	+0.733 48.093	0.035	90.417
16	G. Shedden Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport	52		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	29	+0.741 48.101	0.008	90.402
17	S. Osborne NAPA Racing UK	77		Ford Focus Titanium	28	+0.750 48.110	0.009	90.385
18	N. Hamilton Team Vertu	28		Hyundai i30N	31	+1.111 48.471	0.361	89.712
19	J. Cook Speedworks Corolla Racing	66		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	22	+1.262 48.622	0.151	89.434
20	M. Buxton Speedworks Corolla Racing	19		Toyota Corolla GR Sport	31	+1.454 48.814	0.192	89.082
21	J. Dorlin Restart Racing	132		Hyundai i30N	4
View full results