Honda’s Dan Cammish was the fastest driver in second practice for the British Touring Car Championship at Croft, as lap times improved by a further six tenths of a second on the freshly resurfaced circuit.
Cammish had been fastest after his first flying lap five minutes into the session, before he was knocked from the top by the Toyota of Tom Ingram and the Vauxhall of Jason Plato a few minutes later.
The Yorkshireman then moved back to the top of the timesheets after 16 minutes with a lap of 1 minute 21.496 seconds, shortly before the red flags came out when Motorbase’s Nic Hamilton hit a tyre stack at the Sunny In corner.
That interruption spelled the end of any further improvements to lap times, as drivers returned to the pits and shifted their setup focus ahead of the afternoon’s qualifying session.
Lap times were in general half a second quicker than first practice, and almost two seconds faster than the previous lap record for the current generation of cars, which was set in 2014.
First practice pace-setter Andrew Jordan ended the session in second in his BMW, just under a tenth of a second away from Cammish, with Team BMW’s Colin Turkington in third.
AmD Tuning’s Sam Tordoff was fourth, although the Honda driver picked up damage to the front-left corner of his Honda in the final five minutes when he hit the tyres at Sunny In.
Power Maxed Racing’s Plato was fifth after further improving his time, ahead of the second Halfords Yuasa Racing Honda of Matt Neal in sixth.
Stephen Jelley made it into the top ten in his BMW 125i in seventh, ahead of the newer 3 Series being driven by BMW’s Tom Oliphant in eighth, the latter being just over half a second off the pace.
Subaru’s Ash Sutton and AmD’s Rory Butcher completed the top ten, whilst Motorbase’s Tom Chilton was 11th fastest as the Fords again failed to break into the single-digit positions.
Ciceley Motorsport’s Adam Morgan was 12th, with the Mercedes driver having a spin at the first corner near the end of the session.
Both 16th-placed Senna Proctor and 22nd-placed Jack Goff were shown black flags towards the end of the session for repeated track limits exceedances.
Speedworks Motorsport’s Tom Ingram was just 17th fastest in the sole Toyota in the field, ending the session as the last driver within a second of the pace.
Having been barred from taking to the circuit in first practice for breaching testing rules by taking part in a race at Croft two weeks’ ago, prior to the BTCC visit, Exceler8 Motorsport’s Rob Smith was just 29th in second practice, over two and a half seconds off the pace and quicker only than MG team-mate Sam Osborne.
Qualifying is scheduled to get underway at 15:05 BST.
Session results
| POS | NO | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | GAP |
| 1 | 27 | Dan CAMMISH |  |
Halfords Yuasa Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 16 | 1:21.496 | 0.000 |
| 2 | 77 | Andrew JORDAN | |
BMW Pirtek Racing | BMW 330i M Sport | 18 | 1:21.594 | 0.098 |
| 3 | 1 | Colin TURKINGTON | |
Team BMW | BMW 330i M Sport | 16 | 1:21.739 | 0.243 |
| 4 | 600 | Sam TORDOFF | |
Cobra Sport AmD AutoAid / RCIB Insurance | Honda Civic Type R | 12 | 1:21.752 | 0.256 |
| 5 | 11 | Jason PLATO | |
Sterling Insurance with Power Maxed Racing | Vauxhall Astra | 17 | 1:21.835 | 0.339 |
| 6 | 25 | Matt NEAL | |
Halfords Yuasa Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 14 | 1:21.840 | 0.344 |
| 7 | 12 | Stephen JELLEY | |
Team Parker Racing | BMW 125i M Sport | 20 | 1:21.965 | 0.469 |
| 8 | 15 | Tom OLIPHANT | |
Team BMW | BMW 330i M Sport | 17 | 1:22.004 | 0.508 |
| 9 | 116 | Ashley SUTTON | |
Adrian Flux Subaru Racing | Subaru Levorg | 16 | 1:22.013 | 0.517 |
| 10 | 6 | Rory BUTCHER | |
Cobra Sport AmD AutoAid / RCIB Insurance | Honda Civic Type R | 15 | 1:22.098 | 0.602 |
| 11 | 3 | Tom CHILTON | |
Team Shredded Wheat Racing with Gallagher | Ford Focus RS | 12 | 1:22.243 | 0.747 |
| 12 | 33 | Adam MORGAN | |
Mac Tools with Ciceley Motorsport | Mercedes-Benz A-Class | 18 | 1:22.251 | 0.755 |
| 13 | 9 | Rob COLLARD | |
Sterling Insurance with Power Maxed Racing | Vauxhall Astra | 18 | 1:22.269 | 0.773 |
| 14 | 22 | Chris SMILEY | |
BTC Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 18 | 1:22.315 | 0.819 |
| 15 | 24 | Jake HILL | |
TradePriceCars.com | Audi S3 | 15 | 1:22.405 | 0.909 |
| 16 | 18 | Senna PROCTOR | |
Adrian Flux Subaru Racing | Subaru Levorg | 18 | 1:22.422 | 0.926 |
| 17 | 80 | Tom INGRAM | |
Team Toyota GB with Ginsters | Toyota Corolla | 17 | 1:22.457 | 0.961 |
| 18 | 16 | Aiden MOFFAT | |
Laser Tools Racing | Mercedes-Benz A-Class | 16 | 1:22.547 | 1.051 |
| 19 | 48 | Ollie JACKSON | |
Team Shredded Wheat Racing with Gallagher | Ford Focus RS | 17 | 1:22.612 | 1.116 |
| 20 | 66 | Josh COOK | |
BTC Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 18 | 1:22.625 | 1.129 |
| 21 | 303 | Matt SIMPSON | |
Simpson Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 16 | 1:22.992 | 1.496 |
| 22 | 31 | Jack GOFF | |
RCIB Insurance with Fox Transport | Volkswagen CC | 13 | 1:23.055 | 1.559 |
| 23 | 32 | Daniel ROWBOTTOM | |
Cataclean Racing with Ciceley Motorsport | Mercedes-Benz A-Class | 14 | 1:23.135 | 1.639 |
| 24 | 8 | Mark BLUNDELL | |
TradePriceCars.com | Audi S3 | 18 | 1:23.210 | 1.714 |
| 25 | 41 | Carl BOARDLEY | |
RCIB Insurance with Fox Transport | Volkswagen CC | 13 | 1:23.352 | 1.856 |
| 26 | 777 | Michael CREES | |
GKR Scaffolding with Autobrite Direct | Volkswagen CC | 16 | 1:23.419 | 1.923 |
| 27 | 19 | Bobby THOMPSON | |
GKR Scaffolding with Autobrite Direct | Volkswagen CC | 12 | 1:23.503 | 2.007 |
| 28 | 28 | Nicolas HAMILTON | |
ROKiT Racing with Motorbase | Ford Focus RS | 6 | 1:23.709 | 2.213 |
| 29 | 37 | Rob SMITH | |
Exceler8 Motorsport | MG6 | 16 | 1:24.039 | 2.543 |
| 30 | 4 | Sam OSBORNE | |
Exceler8 Motorsport | MG6 | 19 | 1:24.210 | 2.714 |