BTCC Donington Park: Cammish beats Sutton for Ford 1-2 in race two

Dan Cammish led home Ash Sutton in a 1-2 for the Alliance Racing Ford Focus Titanium squad in the second race of the British Touring Car Championship round at Donington Park.

Cammish was the fourth leader of an entertaining race, while early leader Sutton worked his customary miracle to finish second on the hard-compound Goodyear tyres against a sea of competitors on the medium rubber.

Sutton worked his way past the polesitting CPRL Mercedes A35 Saloon of Adam Morgan on the Craner Curves on the opening lap, and the hard-tyre-shod Lancastrian eventually faded to ninth at the finish.

Dan Rowbottom got past team-mate Morgan on the second lap, and Cammish quickly followed him through to move into third.

Sutton now faced challenges from the medium-tyred Rowbottom and Cammish, and the inevitable move from the bearded Midlander came at the Esses on the fourth lap, Cammish then demoting team-mate Sutton at the Goddards hairpin.

Now Cammish went after Rowbottom. He got alongside at the Melbourne hairpin, then again into Goddards, with contact sending the Mercedes wide and allowing Cammish into the lead.

Ashley Sutton, NAPA Racing UK

Photo by: JEP

Tom Ingram, from ninth on the grid, was now moving into the picture in his Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N Fastback, and was up to fourth by lap six of 14 from ninth on the grid.

But despite being armed with medium tyres and a bagful of TOCA Turbo Boost, Ingram could not make a move stick on Sutton, who had just two laps of TTB.

Far from dropping a place, Sutton gained one when the Mercedes of Rowbottom slowed momentarily exiting the Esses with just over four laps remaining, but recovered just in time to maintain third position ahead of Ingram.

By the time Ingram finally got past Rowbottom into the Esses on the penultimate lap for third, Sutton was secure. Up front, Cammish slowed on the run to the finish line, the Valvoline-liveried Focus just 0.437 seconds ahead of the NAPA example.

“You always hope for the best, starting from what you feel is the prime position,” said Cammish of his grid position as the highest-placed runner on soft tyres.

“You’re planning, ‘How do I get through?’ I thought we did a good job of picking our moments and I think we managed it well. Then it was a case of bringing it home, and I managed to get a nice photo-finish for the guys at Valvoline and NAPA!

“Testament to Ash – that was an amazing drive.”

Tom Ingram, Team VERTU

Photo by: JEP

An unimpressed Ingram was clearly inferring afterwards that the Hyundais are lacking straightline speed, and the reigning champion has dropped to third in the standings, one point behind Cammish and a whopping 97 adrift of Sutton.

Behind fourth-placed Rowbottom, Ricky Collard moved his Excelr8 Hyundai past the Power Maxed Racing Audi A3 Saloon of Dexter Patterson at Redgate on the final lap for fifth.

Aron Taylor-Smith was seventh in his Speedworks Motorsport-run Laser Tools Toyota Corolla GR Sport from Aiden Moffat (PMR Audi) and Morgan.

Chris Smiley and his Restart Racing Hyundai nabbed the final spot in the top 10 from Daryl De Leon’s West Surrey Racing BMW on the last lap, and the Northern Irishman was rewarded when Cammish drew him on reversed-grid pole position for the final race.

BTCC Donington Park - Race 2 results

RACE2

All Stats

 

Cla	Driver	#		Car	Laps	Time	Interval	km/h	Retirement	Points
1	D. Cammish NAPA Racing UK			Ford Focus Titanium	14	22'18.031		93.58		20
2	A. Sutton NAPA Racing UK			Ford Focus Titanium	14	+0.437 22'18.468	0.437	93.55		17
3	T. Ingram Team Vertu			Hyundai i30N	14	+2.509 22'20.540	2.072	93.41		15
4	D. Rowbottom Cataclean Plato Racing			Mercedes A35 Saloon	14	+3.652 22'21.683	1.143	93.33		13
5	R. Collard Team Vertu			Hyundai i30N	14	+4.660 22'22.691	1.008	93.26		11
6	D. Patterson Steel Seal with Power Maxed Racing			Audi A3 Saloon	14	+5.810 22'23.841	1.150	93.18		10
7	A. Taylor-Smith Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport			Toyota Corolla GR Sport	14	+6.045 22'24.076	0.235	93.16		9
8	A. Moffat LKQ Euro Car Parts with Power Maxed Racing			Audi A3 Saloon	14	+8.431 22'26.462	2.386	93.00		8
9	A. Morgan Cataclean Plato Racing			Mercedes A35 Saloon	14	+10.085 22'28.116	1.654	92.88		7
10	C. Smiley Restart Racing			Hyundai i30N	14	+11.683 22'29.714	1.598	92.77		6
11	D. De Leon West Surrey Racing			BMW 330i M Sport	14	+13.036 22'31.067	1.353	92.68		5
12	C. Rainford West Surrey Racing			BMW 330i M Sport	14	+13.418 22'31.449	0.382	92.66		4
13	G. Shedden Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport			Toyota Corolla GR Sport	14	+13.827 22'31.858	0.409	92.63		3
14	T. Chilton Team Vertu			Hyundai i30N	14	+14.417 22'32.448	0.590	92.59		2
15	J. Cook Speedworks Corolla Racing			Toyota Corolla GR Sport	14	+15.545 22'33.576	1.128	92.51		1
16	R. Bensley Speedworks Corolla Racing			Toyota Corolla GR Sport	14	+21.555 22'39.586	6.010	92.10
17	L. Selby NAPA Racing UK			Ford Focus Titanium	14	+24.021 22'42.052	2.466	91.93
18	N. Hamilton Team Vertu			Hyundai i30N	14	+27.617 22'45.648	3.596	91.69
19	M. Doble LKQ Euro Car Parts with Power Maxed Racing			Audi A3 Saloon	14	+37.827 22'55.858	10.210	91.01
20	N. Halstead Steel Seal with Power Maxed Racing			Audi A3 Saloon	14	+45.429 23'03.460	7.602	90.51
dnf	D. Lloyd Restart Racing			Hyundai i30N	13	+1 Lap 20'59.424	1 Lap	92.32	Retirement
dnf	S. Osborne NAPA Racing UK			Ford Focus Titanium	0				Retirement
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