Thompson leads the procession

race at Croft.
The Honda Accord driver, in front of his Northern home crowd, held on
Under pressure to claim the win in round 13 of
the Auto Trader British Touring Car Championship.

Second, and the only driver able to stay in touch with Thompson, was David
Leslie, the Nissan Primera driver having started alongside the Honda on the outside of row one.

The final podium place went to Thompson's team-mate Peter Kox, his
best result for Honda since joining the team at the beginning of 1998.

The top five finished in the order that they started this processional race in which
overtaking moves were almost completely absent. The nearest the crowd got to excitement was when Jason Plato locked up his brakes into the hairpin and tapped points leader Laurent Aiello, although both continued unscathed.

In the Independents category, Matt Neal fought his way up to tenth from his
sixteenth grid spot to take the win. Mark Blair was twelfth in his Vauxhall
Vectra.

Sprint race results from Croft: