Josh Cooks adds to Thruxton win tally in season opener

Josh Cook maintained his strong record at Thruxton as he powered his way to victory in the opening race of the new BTCC season.

Ash Sutton had made the best start to lead the field up through Allard for the first time from Colin Turkington and Cook, with Cook then trying to reclaim the place from the BMW going into the complex.

Sutton had a slender lead but contact from Turkington turning into the right hander tipped the Infiniti into a spin and dropped the champion to the back of the field, with Cook able to get ahead of Turkington into the lead.

Turkington then came under pressure from Tom Ingram’s Hyundai going into Church as the EXCELR8 man took second spot, with Jake Hill also clearing the BMW before the end of lap one – with the race then going under caution.

That was as a result of a clash between Gordon Shedden and Chris Smiley heading into Goodwood. Shedden was trying to make a move for position on Ollie Jackson but tagged the rear of the Focus and ran onto the grass on the infield before coming back onto the circuit and collecting an innocent Smiley – with both cars going off into the tyres.

Elsewhere, Tom Oliphant’s BMW was suddenly seen spinning across the grass on the run up Woodham Hill and dropped to the back of the field alongside Sutton, with Jackson forced to pit to check the rear of his Ford and also dropping away from the leaders.

Cook led the field round behind the Safety Car ahead of Ingram, Hill, Turkington, with Rory Butcher sitting in fifth spot in the Toyota and Jason Plato avoiding the chaos ahead to move up into sixth in the Vauxhall Astra.

The race resumed on lap seven with Cook under pressure immediately from Ingram who couldn’t make a move stick at Campbell and had to settle back into second spot. Behind, Dan Rowbottom was making good progress in the remaining Dynamics Honda, quickly getting ahead of Adam Morgan’s BMW into ninth spot.

Cook quickly started to edge away from Ingram at the front, with Hill retaining third despite pressure from Turkington, with Butcher slipping way form the leading four as he was forced to contend with pressure from Plato and Dan Cammish behind.

Stephen Jelley had been part of that squabble before he was forced into the pits with grass in the front of his BMW.

By the end of lap twelve, Sutton had managed to recover into the points scoring positions in the Infiniti, with Oliphant giving chase as he took looked to try and salvage something from the season opener.

Butcher’s hold on fifth would end up on lap 13 when Plato made a move for position into the Complex, briefly getting ahead before Butcher fought back into Seagrave. That delayed the pair enough to let Cammish nip ahead into fifth and he quickly started to break away from in fifth.

At the front, Cook continued to edge away from Ingram as he in turn extended his advantage over Hill, who still had his mirrors full of Turkington’s BMW.

Cook’s advantage would increase through the closing laps before he crossed the line to take the first win of the season for BTC Racing, with a gap of just over two seconds over Ingram – who matched EXCELR8’s best result to date with the Hyundai.

Hill held on for third despite the best efforts of Turkington with Cammish taking fifth and Butcher holding on for sixth over Plato. The pair were being caught in the closing stages by a charging Rowbottom, but he had to settle for eighth spot – still his best result by far in the series – with Morgan and Sutton rounding out the top ten after the latter cleared team-mates Aiden Moffat and Carl Boardley in the closing laps.

Oliphant meanwhile managed to secure the final point, whilst there was also points first time out for the new CUPRA thanks to Jack Goff in 13th.