Tom Ingram says that he ‘messed up’ his lap in qualifying for the British Touring Car Championship at Oulton Park, after managing just the 12th fastest lap and his first non-top-ten start of the season.
Carrying the maximum 75 kg of success ballast, Ingram crept into the top ten in qualifying at the half-way stage, before slipping out despite improving his time just before the final red flag.
The Toyota driver cut a frustrated figure after qualifying, admitting that he failed to get the best out of himself after ‘messing up’ his qualifying lap.
“It was the worst of the worst scenarios,” said Ingram to TouringCars.Net. “We knew that with maximum weight around a circuit like Oulton it was always going to be massively difficult and that we were never really going to be looking at the front row.
“I’m kicking myself because I know I’ve messed it up really and I could have found a load more time. We had a car that was capable of being inside the top five today, but I cocked it up so we’re not, which is really annoying.
“From a driver’s point of view I messed up and didn’t get everything I should have got out of it.”
Ingram is expecting a difficult trio of races with the full amount of lead around a circuit where passing is a challenge, with the Speedworks driver targeting three top ten finishes on race day.
“It’s going to be hard carrying the weight during the races, so we know it’s going to be tough but we’ll do our best and try and stay out of trouble.
“There are some interesting drivers ahead of us that are going to be trying quite hard to get some good TV time and points, so we’ll hopefully leave them to their exciting battles.
“We need to just stay out of the way, try and pick some points up and get three finishes inside the top ten and we’ll leave happy.”