Photo: PSP Images

Jake Hill tops the times in first official test session at Thruxton

By

West Surrey Racing newcomer Jake Hill topped the first of the British Touring Car Championship’s official pre-season test sessions at Thruxton.

Hill completed 31 laps in the BMW 330 e M-sport to head the times in a timne of 1.15.744, 0.215 clear of EXCELR8 Motorsport’s Tom Ingram and 0.406 ahead of Motorbase Performance’s Dan Cammish.

Hill’s team-mate Colin Turkington was next up in fourth ahead of BTC Racing’s Josh Cook, with reigning champion Ash Sutton in sixth for Motorbase Performance.

Stephen Jelley (West Surrey Racing), Rory Butcher (Speedworks Motorsport), Adam Morgan (Ciceley Motorsport) and Jason Plato (BTC Racing) rounded out the top 10, with Butcher (41 laps) completing the joint most running along with Ollie Jackson (Motorbase Performance).

The session was punctuated by a handful of red flag stoppages, the longest coming after an incident between Gordon Shedden (Team Dynamics) and Jelley at the complex, which caused significant damage to both the Honda Civic Type-R and BMW 330 M-Sport. Shedden completed just four laps of running as a result.

There was also a brief lull in the action due to a late rain shower, which left the track empty for around 15 minutes.

Michael Crees (Power Maxed Racing); Aiden Moffat (Aiden Moffat Racing), Nic Hamilton (Team HARD) and Rick Parfitt (Team HARD) didn’t run during the session, while Jack Goff (Team HARD) isn’t at the circuit.

The second three-hour session gets underway at 14:00 BST.