BTCC leader Ash Sutton felt a front row result was there for qualifying after negotiating a « horrible’ ‘session to qualify eighth at Silverstone
UK Touring Car Championship leader Ash Sutton felt a front row result was there for qualifying after negotiating a ‘horrific’ session to qualify eighth at Silverstone
The Laser Tools Racing driver arrived in qualifying as one of the favorites to take pole position but spent the entire session catching up after being called to the scales for technical checks during the phase of warming up his race
Sutton explained that cold tires and subsequently low tire pressure during the warm-up phase meant his Infiniti Q50 initially failed ride height control, putting him on the back foot for the rest of the session
“I’m not happy with the P8,” Sutton told Crashnet “We were just unhappy that we were called out at the start of the session on the scales to check the ride height etc.
« But we were still in the warm-up phase so we failed at ride height and were told we obviously needed to change that
« We didn’t reach ride height just because the tires were cold The hotter the tire the higher the car gets I say we failed it was a bit of a touch and go
« So we were told we had to try our luck and unfortunately it ruined the balance we had for the first part of qualifying »
Sutton recovered to score a decent time for the eighth, but felt that the combination of light rain and the car’s continued balance from the first run meant there were 04s left on the table
« The second set it started to rain so we got caught up in a really tough one I felt like we should have been in the front row There was another 04s in the car comfortably », continued the 2017 champion
« It was just one of those things. It takes 5/6 good laps to get the real temperature in the tire here. We were playing catch-up from that point on when it was raining
« Before leaving for the second set, we were in a very bad position We got something back We had the pace for a first row here
« I don’t think we would have beaten Cammish He was a little unstoppable in this regard We certainly could have been second One of those horrible situations »
Looking ahead to Sunday’s three races, Sutton has no reservations about the pace of his Infiniti, but is aware of the potential difficulty of making his way through the peloton from eighth
Importantly, Sutton will start the race day four places behind his closest title challenger Colin Turkington, who qualified fourth
“Obviously we’ll come back to what we know The car will be absolutely mega as you saw in FP1 and FP2 We can do that every lap I’m not worried about that,” Sutton said. p>
« This place is kind of like Thruxton It’s pretty hard to overtake All the high speed corners you get aero wash and stuff like that That’s what we’ll be up against »
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British Touring Car Championship, Daniel Cammish, Silverstone Circuit, Tom Ingram, Colin Turkington, Matt Neal, Ashley Sutton, Rory Butcher
World News – GB – Sutton was disappointed with miss out on first row after « horrible » qualifying
