Autosport's stars of the 2020 TOCA support series

The TOCA support package brought its usual blend of action and excitement in 2020, providing plenty of close racing on ITV4 for those unable to get to British Touring Car Championship meetings due to the pandemic.

The British Formula 4, Ginetta Junior and GT4 Supercup, plus TOCA newcomer Mini Challenge JCW titles all went down to the wire at Brands Hatch, with only the Porsche Carrera Cup GB having a truly dominant champion.

But who were the brightest lights of the campaign? Autosport reviews all the action and picks out its top 10.

British Formula 4 - Browning prevails amid Hollywood drama

Even now, what happened in the British Formula 4 finale still seems barely believable. It was always going to be close, with Luke Browning and Zak O'Sullivan arriving at Brands Hatch tied on points. When Browning held off O'Sullivan to win the opener and also beat him in race two, it looked to be the Fortec driver's crown to lose. And he very nearly did lose it.

The pair went off on oil at the start of race three but, while O'Sullivan soon regained the lead, Browning spun and was at the back. With rain intensifying, the race was red-flagged, O'Sullivan believing he had taken an unlikely win.

"I was thinking 'if I've not won this, that's my career over' - that's how important it was for us. At some point, you've got to ultimately win a championship to move up the ranks" Luke Browning

"I came into parc ferme and looked to the right and could see Carlin and O'Sullivan celebrating and I couldn't believe what was happening," Browning recalls. "I had beaten him in race one and race two, and race three - with a 16-point lead - should've been the easiest one. I thought how unjustified would it be losing it there?"

Instead, it was O'Sullivan left bemoaning his misfortune - as less than 75% of the race was completed, half points were awarded and the title was Browning's.

"It was one of those things," says O'Sullivan, who was angered by the red-flag decision. "Everyone has their shoulda, coulda, wouldas but it wouldn't have taken much for me to win."

O'Sullivan felt the title was a "long shot" ahead of that final race, as passing team-mate Christian Mansell as safety car boards went out in the second contest had earned him a costly post-race penalty, but he had a clear plan of how he would approach that last battle.

"I had to get into the lead and then try and cause as much chaos as possible," he explains. "I made quite a risky move and I was in the lead and wanted to try and stay there and defend and cause a bit of chaos."

But the top three all going off on oil on the first lap was not the chaos O'Sullivan had in mind - he was instead intending to back the pack up in the hope Browning would come under attack and drop down the order.

It was not to be for O'Sullivan, who says "there weren't that many expectations" heading into his first year in single-seaters and instead wanted to treat it as a learning campaign, with the title being a potential added bonus. But the situation was very different for second-year driver Browning as he began 2020 feeling under pressure. It was his fifth season of car racing and he knew nothing less than the title would be enough.

"I was thinking 'if I've not won this, that's my career over' - that's how important it was for us," Browning admits. "At some point, you've got to ultimately win a championship to move up the ranks."

But getting on the grid at all was a challenge as he only initially had the budget for three rounds and was only able to do a fraction of the testing of some of his rivals. It was therefore just as well he moved into the points lead with an impressive hat-trick at Oulton Park in event three. Despite building a 57-point advantage, he struggled at the slipstreaming tracks like Thruxton and Silverstone and O'Sullivan reeled him in. In the end, O'Sullivan fell four points short, but still found it "a really good learning experience".

Ginetta Junior - Rookie Lebbon continues Elite's streak

Elite Motorsport has been the driving force in Ginetta Junior recently but faced an uphill task to continue its sequence of fielding the champion. With a shortage of second-year drivers around, Elite needed one of its six rookies to win the crown - a feat never managed before. Until now.

Up stepped Ginetta scholar Tom Lebbon. "Rookies have always struggled in the first quarter of the year," says Elite boss Eddie Ives. "They always come on strong and the key is to be strong from round one."

And that is exactly what Lebbon did. Taking a double pole at Donington Park was some way to make an entrance. Although he got shuffled back, scoring a best result of second, it was still an impressive debut. And, after some close battles with Bailey Voisin, he took his maiden win at the following Brands Hatch round.

"We had such a good season - we had the most wins and led the championship for the majority, but the end result wasn't what I wanted" Bailey Voisin

"I think COVID helped us a little bit," continues Ives. "We were more prepared in August than we were in March because we had a bit of time off to prep the cars and more testing in June and July, and that helped."

For the first half of the season, Voisin and Lebbon were never separated by more than a handful of points and had some brilliant racing together. Lebbon was first to break away, as Voisin was involved in a pile-up in the second Thruxton race. But, next time out at Silverstone, it was Lebbon's turn to have a shocker. He was demoted from the opening win to 11th for contact, ended the second contest upside down and struggled in race three. Voisin's lead was now 74 and Lebbon admitted he "thought it was all over".

However, he then hit a purple patch of form and Voisin had a nightmare at Croft, an engine infringement sending him to the back. And a lack of time for Voisin to progress in the stop/start Brands finales enabled Lebbon to triumph.

"We had such a good season - we had the most wins and led the championship for the majority, but the end result wasn't what I wanted," says Voisin, who fell to third in the final standings. That was because Josh Rattican was on a late-season charge as his rivals lost their consistency and came incredibly close to snatching the title.

Had those final Brands races not been so disrupted with incidents, the title may well have headed in a different direction. Voisin headed into the last race on the back foot after picking up a penalty for overlapping another car on a safety car restart in the opener - which dropped him from fifth to eighth in the result. He then challenged Lebbon at Graham Hill Bend in race two but ended up losing momentum and dropping behind Rattican.

"I knew I was going to come at least third, so I went for the move and it didn't pay off," says Voisin. "But maybe, with another couple of laps, I would've challenged again for the position I needed."

It was so close among the three in the points that if they had finished in the order of Voisin, Rattican, Lebbon in that race, it would be Voisin celebrating now. However, Voisin admits he was not expecting quite such a strong season.

"We were hoping to be up there but weren't really going for the overall championship," he says. "But now I'm feeling disappointed with third."

Ginetta GT4 Supercup - Burns ends runner-up hoodoo

Of all the British Touring Car supports, the Ginetta GT4 Supercup was perhaps the hardest to predict a champion for after its opening 2020 events. Will Burns, Tom Hibbert and Gus Burton swapped the points lead weekend to weekend and locked out many of the early-season podiums.

But that pattern all changed at Croft, the sixth of eight events. Burns says he "got into a rhythm" in North Yorkshire for the rest of the season that propelled him to a comfortable crown. Two wins and a second at Croft, while Hibbert struggled and impressive rookie Burton dropped back with damage in the finale, allowed Burns to open up a lead he then extended at Snetterton. Had he not been caught out by Rob Boston Racing team-mate Joe Marshall-Birks in the third race, Burns would have grabbed the title with a meeting to spare.

"I did feel quite a bit of pressure - I had so much weight on my shoulders as I didn't want to be finishing runner-up for a third time, it would be borderline embarrassing" Will Burns

For Burns, there was a sense of relief as he finally secured the crown after two near-misses - losing out to Tom Wrigley by three points in 2016 and Harry King by 13 points in 2019.

"I did feel quite a bit of pressure - I had so much weight on my shoulders as I didn't want to be finishing runner-up for a third time, it would be borderline embarrassing," he admits. "That wasn't from anyone else that was just [pressure] from myself but now that weight has been lifted."

Burns says battling King last year helped him to "up his game" for 2020 and target consistency. One area he particularly focused on was qualifying - and that was shown by him only once starting outside of the front row.

Hibbert and Burton failed to show the same consistency, Burton's charge dented by being the unfortunate victim of first-lap contact at Thruxton and Snetterton. Nevertheless, it was still a very strong first season of senior car racing for Burton, who instantly clicked with the greater power of the G55, having shown flashes of pace in Ginetta Junior but was only able to convert that into a handful of podiums. Adam Smalley, meanwhile, grew stronger as the year wore on and is set to be a real contender if he is back next year.

Mini Challenge - Sticking power key to Harrison's success

It is not very often that a champion admits they seriously considered pulling out of a series in the middle of what proved to be a title-winning season. But that was the case for Mini Challenge conqueror Nathan Harrison.

The three-time runner-up staked an early claim with a second and a win in the first two races, before gearbox woes struck the Excelr8 Motorsport driver in the third Donington Park contest and in the Knockhill opener. Considering the competitiveness of the field - which included 2018 champion Ant Whorton-Eales, Renault UK Clio Cup ace Max Coates and regular tin-top frontrunner Dan Zelos - Harrison thought his title chance had gone.

"We were massively down after Knockhill - and just didn't think this championship is meant to be," says Harrison. "We were going to pull the plug and thought we could save the money for next year.

"If you had asked me at the start of the year, I thought there was more chance of pigs flying [than winning the title] but you've got to never give up. The pressure was off and I was just going for race wins."

Sure enough, pole and victory in the first races at Silverstone and Snetterton launched Harrison back into the title fight.

"I would say Snetterton was a big turning point for us as a team," he says. "We all took a different approach set-up wise. It transformed the car and it saved the tyres right to the end of the race. It proved [its success] with the results."

While Harrison hit the sweet spot, a tough weekend in Norfolk for Whorton-Eales and Zelos being bundled out of a podium place in the second Silverstone race hampered their charges, helping Harrison to take the title glory at Brands Hatch. Other drivers starred at times, such as Max Bird and Lewis Brown, but no-one could match the combined total of five wins/second places Harrison scored.

All in all, it was not quite the first season on the BTCC bill Mini Challenge organisers were expecting. Having taken the Clio Cup's place, the series was affected the most by the coronavirus pandemic after a consultation between stakeholders led to the campaign being reduced from eight to just five weekends, a decision Harrison believes was the right one. Consistency, therefore, was never more important and that led to some close but, unfortunately, often processional races at the front.

Porsche Carrera Cup GB - Dominant King a class above

One strike of a Recticel chicane marker at Donington Park and a 0.002-second deficit in qualifying for the Brands Hatch finale were all that separated Harry King from absolute perfection in the Porsche Carrera Cup GB this year.

Without clouting that barrier, Porsche GB Junior King would not have dropped behind Team Parker Racing team-mate Josh Webster in the season-opener and that would have taken his win tally to 13. Had he not encountered engine trouble when leading at Knockhill, that would have been another triumph. And, had he not suffered two punctures while out front at Thruxton - on a weekend where plenty of others had such woes - suddenly, you are looking at an undefeated King.

"I've developed the ability to react quickly and make calculated decisions, which is perhaps what sets me apart" Harry King

"I certainly didn't expect to win it in the fashion we did," says King. "With the Porsche Juniors, they'd usually have a learning year in the first year and follow it up with success in the second. Then, after qualifying at Donington Park, my ambitions and expectations for the year changed - I was on pole there, and it was then I thought we could be in for a strong year."

And it was not just the results that were so impressive, it was the manner of his victories. King's overtaking ability was sensational - notably when recovering from starting 10th at Knockhill.

"I feel my confidence from overtaking comes from feeling totally comfortable in the car, working as one," he says. "I think a bit of it's down to the days of Ginetta Junior, which was like a playground for learning and testing racecraft, and I've developed the ability to react quickly and make calculated decisions, which is perhaps what sets me apart."

Of that there is no question, as he produced one of the most dominant displays seen for a long time, scoring over double the points of every driver bar 2014 champion Webster. And it did not go unnoticed, Autosport readers choosing King as their National Driver of the Year.

Autosport's top 10 TOCA support series drivers

10. Dan Zelos

It may be a surprising choice to include someone who did not win a race all season in this top 10. But despite not standing on the top step of the podium, Zelos still had an impressive Mini Challenge campaign against a plethora of quick racers. His tally of seven podiums was highest of all - and he would likely have had another one had Isaac Smith not shoved him out of the way at Silverstone. An impressive drive to second in the reversed-grid Brands finale again highlighted his ability.

9. Josh Rattican

As Lebbon and Voisin's fortunes began to fluctuate in the middle of the Ginetta Junior season, suddenly it was Rattican who was on a charge. A confidence inspiring maiden win at Knockhill spurred him on to further success and he therefore entered the Brands Hatch season-closer very much in contention. He won the stop/start opener, but could not quite deny Lebbon in race two, still doing enough to finish as runner-up. With a stronger start to the year, he could have been champion, but fell slightly too far behind.

8. Gus Burton

Burton was one of the surprises of the season. He had shown flashes of speed in Ginetta Junior but rarely converted that into strong results. His pace in the GT4 Supercup right from the start of the season was therefore unexpected, but he instantly felt at home in the more powerful car. Burton was unfortunate to get involved in two first-lap incidents that cost him crucial points - nevertheless, it was still a very impressive first season of senior car racing as he took the most podiums of all the Pros.

7. Will Burns

The lowest ranked of the five champions simply because the Ginetta GT4 Supercup had the fewest drivers in its top class, just six at times. But that should take nothing away from Burns, who made up for past disappointment to land the crown. He was on the receiving end of some forceful moves over the initial weekends but really came on strong from Croft onwards and stamped his authority. It may not have been the strongest entry, but 12 top-twos from 19 races is still not to be sniffed at.

6. Nathan Harrison (below)

Finally, Harrison landed that number one spot having finished as Mini Challenge runner-up three times in the past. Aside from some mechanical woes, his consistency was impressive - only once was he off the podium in a non-reversed-grid race when he finished. Considering the quality in the field, that was a significant achievement. Took the joint-highest number of wins and came incredibly close to adding another in the first race at Brands, which allowed him to take the title with ease.

5. Bailey Voisin

Another case of two drivers in the same series that were hard to separate. Voisin took a massive step forward for his second Ginetta Junior season and soon established himself as a leading contender. But his campaign unravelled when sent to the back of
the Croft grid after Ginetta found an illegal restrictor plate. Could still have won the title if his final-race pass on Lebbon had worked, but ran out of time to try again. Dropping behind Josh Rattican in the final standings was somewhat harsh.

4. Tom Lebbon

A history-maker deserves a high spot in this top 10. Yes, the chances of a rookie winning the Ginetta Junior title for the first time increased this year with three-quarters of the grid being first-year drivers, but that takes nothing away from Lebbon's achievement. To qualify on pole for the first round was a signal of intent. Had some brilliant battles with Bailey Voisin over the season and responded terrifically to a nightmarish Silverstone by finishing no lower than second in the final seven races.

3. Zak O'Sullivan

O'Sullivan so nearly profited from the rollercoaster Brands Hatch final race to take the F4 title and would have been a very worthy champion. The single-seater rookie - still only in his second year of car racing, compared to Browning's fifth - really hit his stride in the latter half of the season to reduce Browning's 57-point lead to nothing. His move around the outside of Browning at Paddock was sensational, but his error in Brands race two proved very costly. Certainly marked himself out as a future star.

2. Luke Browning

The fact that Browning and Zak O'Sullivan arrived at Brands Hatch for the finale tied on points says all you need to know about how evenly matched the pair were in British F4 this year. But second-year driver Browning gets the nod for his brilliant Oulton Park hat-trick and delivering when it really mattered in races one and two at Brands, while O'Sullivan made a critical error in passing under yellow flags. Browning had the pace to have likely won the title anyway, even if the finale had not been cut short.

1. Harry King (below)

How could it be anyone else? This has to be one of the simplest decisions over who should be number one in a top 10 ranking. King was sublime this year - there are not enough superlatives to describe his Carrera Cup performances. None of his rivals, including 2014 champion Josh Webster, could get close. Twelve wins and 13 fastest laps from 16 races, and seven poles from eight qualifying sessions are very impressive statistics, and his overtaking prowess made him brilliant to watch. And he is still only 19.