Tom Ingram frustrated by qualifying clash

Tom Ingram admitted he was frustrated by the clash in qualifying that means he will start the opening race of the weekend at Oulton Park from 14th spot on the grid.

The Speedworks driver heads into the third meeting of the BTCC season chasing a first podium finish at the Cheshire circuit and showed strong pace in the two free practice sessions, putting his Toyota Corolla inside the top eight.

Having lost what would have been his fastest time in qualifying to track limits, a lap that would have put him on the third row of the grid, Ingram was pushing hard on the next lap before contact with the VW of Ollie Brown at the final corner.

That resulted in a lengthy stay in the pits as repairs were carried out on the Toyota, with Ingram unable to improve on his early banker lap in the closing stages, leaving him down in 15th spot.

He would then inherit one place when Mike Bushell was handed a penalty after the session that drops him down behind the Toyota.

“After FP2, the car felt okay and we knew we had more to extract from it, so it was quite exciting,” Ingram said. “The car felt awesome, the best I’ve driven round Oulton so far. It was riding the kerbs well, we had good traction – it felt nice.

“I did a good lap that got taken off my for track limits, which is fair as I ran wide at the final corner, and then on the fight back to try and set another lap I got tripped up by another car. It pretty much took us out of the session as the car wasn’t right from there. It’s annoying and frustrating, but there is nothing we can do about it.

“It’s not easy to pass here and it will be difficult from where we are. We’re on the back foot and I guess we can hope for rain as it might help us, but the positive is that we have a car that is good and doing what we want, we just weren’t allowed to get it put together. We have to try and fight back tomorrow.”