BTCC Snetterton: Hill overcomes penalty for second win
Jake Hill overcame a penalty to make it two wins out of two in a dramatic second race of the British Touring Car Championship round at Snetterton.
Marcus Simmons
Edited:
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Hill started from pole position in a race delayed by a thunderstorm that struck during the preceding Formula 4 race, but he and Bobby Thompson briefly jumped their West Surrey Racing BMW 330e M Sports forward before lights out, earning themselves 10-second penalties.
To add insult to injury, Thompson bogged down dramatically at the start proper, and converted his front-row grid position to fourth place.
With the sun out, Rob Huff and Chris Smiley had taken the gamble on the grid for slick tyres, and at the end of the formation lap, Ash Sutton, Tom Ingram, Colin Turkington, Dan Rowbottom, Ronan Pearson and Aron Taylor-Smith all peeled in for the dry-weather rubber.
With the new BTCC sporting regulations, the leading runners from the opening race had to go for the hard-compound slick, meaning it would be tough to switch on in the slippery conditions, but Smiley and Pearson were on mediums, with Taylor-Smith on softs.
Up front, Hill got his head down to negate his penalty. By one-third distance, he was over five seconds in front of second-placed Andrew Watson, who had made a sensational start in his Speedworks Motorsport Toyota Corolla GR Sport to run ahead of Dan Cammish’s Allied Racing Ford Focus ST and Thompson.
But this was the crossover point, at least for Taylor-Smith, whose Power Maxed Racing Vauxhall Astra set the fastest lap on its soft Goodyears, had carved through most of the hard-tyred runners, but still had a deficit of over 40s to erode to Hill.
Within two laps of this, heavy rain returned, and those on the slicks were scuppered. With five laps remaining, Hill had cancelled out his penalty, and his advantage grew even bigger when Watson skated off the circuit at the esses.
Bobby Thompson, Team BMW
Photo by: JEP / Motorsport Images
Cammish had fended off concerted early attacks from Thompson, and eventually crossed the line in second place, 16s behind the victorious Hill.
“It’s probably the most professional drive I’ve ever done,” said Hill. “That man Craig [Porley, Hill’s engineer] is an absolute genius. How fast is that car? It’s ridiculous. It was like driving a car in the dry.”
Of his penalty, he added: “It was handbrake and hold, but as I loaded it up it crept a little bit. I thought, ‘If they’ve seen it, I’m done.’”
Josh Cook finished fourth in his Speedworks Toyota ahead of the Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N of Tom Chilton, Mikey Doble (PMR Vauxhall) and Watson, but all moved up as a result of Thompson’s penalty, which dropped the BMW to seventh.
Doble then moved above Chilton in the results to fourth when the veteran was penalised post-race for passing the Vauxhall during an off-track excursion at the esses and relegated to fifth.
The top 10 was completed by Aiden Moffat (Speedworks Toyota), Sam Osborne (Alliance Ford) and Daryl DeLeon (Unlimited Motorsport Cupra Leon), with Osborne drawn on the reversed-grid pole.
Taylor-Smith headed home the slick runners in 12th, while Ingram lost the final point for 15th place on the last lap to Turkington, who had pitted back onto wet-weather tyres.
A disastrous race, featuring numerous offs, befell championship leader Sutton, who pitted for wets after hitting the barriers and trailed home a lap down.
The results mean Hill has moved level with Turkington for second in the standings, just eight points behind Sutton.
BTCC Snetterton - Race 2 results
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| Cla | Driver | # | Car | Laps | Time | Interval | km/h | Retirement | Points | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 1 |  J. Hill Laser Tools Racing with MB Motorsport |
BMW 330e M Sport | 12 |
26'43.848 |
|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 2 | D. Cammish NAPA Racing UK |
Ford Focus ST | 12 |
+6.260 26'50.108 |
6.260 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 3 | J. Cook LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ |
Toyota Corolla GR Sport | 12 |
+9.974 26'53.822 |
3.714 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 4 | T. Chilton Team Bristol Street Motors |
Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance | 12 |
+10.696 26'54.544 |
0.722 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 5 |
M. Doble Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing
|
Vauxhall Astra | 12 |
+14.794 26'58.642 |
4.098 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 6 | A. Watson Toyota Gazoo Racing UK |
Toyota Corolla GR Sport | 12 |
+16.626 27'00.474 |
1.832 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 7 |
B. Thompson Zeus Cloud Racing with WSR
|
BMW 330e M Sport | 12 |
+16.643 27'00.491 |
0.017 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 8 | A. Moffat LKQ Euro Car Parts with SYNETIQ |
Toyota Corolla GR Sport | 12 |
+23.431 27'07.279 |
6.788 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 9 | S. Osborne NAPA Racing UK |
Ford Focus ST | 12 |
+26.823 27'10.671 |
3.392 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 10 |
D. De Duckhams Racing with Bartercard
|
Cupra León | 12 |
+29.165 27'13.013 |
2.342 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 11 |
S. Sumpton Restart Racing
|
Cupra León | 12 |
+33.174 27'17.022 |
4.009 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 12 |  A. Taylor-Smith Evans Halshaw Power Maxed Racing |
Vauxhall Astra | 12 |
+1'08.350 27'52.198 |
35.176 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 13 | C. Smiley Restart Racing |
Cupra León | 12 |
+1'32.158 28'16.006 |
23.808 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 14 | R. Huff Toyota Gazoo Racing UK |
Toyota Corolla GR Sport | 12 |
+1'33.739 28'17.587 |
1.581 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 15 | C. Turkington Team BMW |
BMW 330e M Sport | 12 |
+1'51.605 28'35.453 |
17.866 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 16 | T. Ingram Team Bristol Street Motors |
Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance | 12 |
+1'52.272 28'36.120 |
0.667 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| 17 | D. Rowbottom NAPA Racing UK |
Ford Focus ST | 11 |
1 Lap |
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| 18 | A. Morgan Team BMW |
BMW 330e M Sport | 11 |
1 Lap |
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| 19 |
R. Pearson Team Bristol Street Motors
|
Hyundai i30 Fastback N Performance | 11 |
1 Lap |
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| 20 | A. Sutton NAPA Racing UK |
Ford Focus ST | 11 |
1 Lap |
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| View full results | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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