Chilton beats Ingram to pole in wet

Tom Chilton led Tom Ingram to a Hyundai 1-2 in wet qualifying for the British Touring Car Championship round at the Donington Park Grand Prix circuit.

Conditions deteriorated during the second phase of qualifying, so that everyone took to the track on wet-weather Goodyears in the Quick Six shootout.

It resulted in Chilton’s Excelr8 Motorsport Hyundai i30 N Fastback beating the sister car of championship leader Ingram by 0.353 seconds for the Surrey veteran’s first BTCC pole for 14 years – and the 11th of his career.

Not that Ingram will mind too much – title rival Ash Sutton failed to progress out of Q2 and will instead start from the sixth row after a miscue on tyre strategy from the Alliance Racing Ford Focus ST team.

The high-profile scalps from the early stages of qualifying meant that Chilton and Ingram were the only two in the final phase not to have the maximum 15 seconds of TOCA Turbo Boost, with Chilton’s 13s sufficient to overcome the measly single second of Ingram.

“It’s nice to finally get another one!” beamed Chilton after breaking his lengthy pole drought. “I tell you what – they were tricky conditions, and I had to use all my experience to keep it on the black stuff.

“You have to feel the tyre, feel the grip and stay off the white lines – they’re slippery as you like. And just not make mistakes. I was so happy with that lap.”

Third on the grid, albeit a second adrift of the leading pair, was an outstanding effort from Mikey Doble aboard one of the loaned Cupra Leons procured by Power Maxed Racing following the fire that incinerated its facility and equipment three weeks ago.

Doble, who took a detour through the gravel at the Melbourne hairpin in a late bid to improve, will line up on the second row with Chris Smiley, the Restart Racing Hyundai driver who leads him in the Independents’ championship.

Completing the six runners in Q3 were Daryl DeLeon, who led the West Surrey Racing BMW 330i M Sport contingent, and the Excelr8 Hyundai of Senna Proctor.

Quickest of those to miss out in Q2 was the Alliance Ford of Dan Cammish, who will therefore start seventh. While the majority ran slick tyres and simply got slower and slower as conditions deteriorated, Cammish’s team-mates Sutton and Dan Rowbottom went out on wets and slicks respectively, only to pit early to take the opposite strategy and miss the optimum window on either compound.

Rowbottom will therefore start eighth and Sutton 11th, split by Adam Morgan (Excelr8 Hyundai) and Dan Lloyd (Restart Hyundai), the last-named using the same strategy as Rowbottom.

Also out in Q2 was reigning champion and star of Knockhill Jake Hill, who was left fuming after track limits judgements denied him a serious laptime in his WSR BMW.