Ash Sutton will “settle” for seventh

Ash Sutton insisted he was happy to settle for seventh after a solid performance in qualifying for the opening BTCC race of the weekend at Brands Hatch.

Sutton arrived in Kent as the championship leader after a strong showing in the previous meeting at Snetterton, but that meant carrying maximum ballast on his Infiniti Q50.

Despite that, the defending champion was able to secure a place on the fourth row of the grid, lining up directly behind team-mate Aiden Moffat.

“If you compared it to our rivals, Tom Ingram is just ahead with a little less weight and then Colin Turkington is outside the top ten – so I’ll settle for that,” he said. “We saw the pace Aiden had to put his car in P5 and he deserves the limelight for a good job today so we’re in a good place as a team.

“The track evolved a lot today from practice to qualifying but traffic was an issue today and I’m not sure some drivers were using their mirrors at all. I know I got held up and others have said the same.

“We just have to focus on tomorrow now and hopefully we can have a good start and stay out of trouble.”