AmD Tuning’s Rory Butcher capitalised on contact between Jason Plato and Ash Sutton to take victory in a dramatic third British Touring Car Championship race at Snetterton.
2017 champion Sutton started from the front row of the grid on the favoured softer compound rubber, with reverse-grid polesitter Chris Smiley losing out to Jason Plato who nudged him wide and sliced through on the inside at the Montreal hairpin on the opening lap.
A titanic battle ensued as Plato defended from Sutton, with the Subaru racer finding a way past on the outside of the hairpin on lap seven, briefly gaining the lead before the pair again made contact at Agostini.
The duo continued to scrap until lap nine, when they went three-wide with Butcher on the Bentley straight, eventually making contact as Sutton tried the outside line but was spun around by Plato.
That allowed the soft-shod Butcher through for the lead, followed by Josh Cook who redeemed a difficult weekend with second place in the final encounter ahead of BTC Racing team-mate Chris Smiley.
Butcher’s victory marked his first ‘on the road’ win after he inherited the Brands Hatch race three win after Tom Chilton recieved a post-race penalty for contact.
In fourth position was Rob Collard – also on the soft tyre – just in front of Power Maxed Racing team-mate Plato, with 2013 champion Andrew Jordan in sixth.
Race one winner Tom Ingram put in a great recovery drive after a disastrous race two to come home eighth, with another strong points finish for Ollie Jackson in ninth.
Reigning champion and second race winner Colin Turkington struggled with the hard tyre and maximum ballast to complete the top ten, while Team HARD’s Jack Goff progressed from 30th on the grid to finish 11th.
Matt Neal didn’t have the race he would have liked on the favourable tyre and got tangled up in incidents before finishing 12th, ahead of Tom Chilton and Matt Simpson.
Sam Osborne secured the first points for the Excelr8 Motorsport squad, finishing 15th in the MG6.
Ash Sutton would eventually finish 20th ahead of Aiden Moffat’s Inifiniti Q50, while Jake Hill – who had also been in the lead battle – finished 24th after dropping back rapidly, seemingly with an issue.
Race result
| POS | NO | CL | DRIVER | NAT | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | BEST | GD |
| 1 | 6 | I | Rory BUTCHER |  |
Cobra Sport AmD AutoAid / RCIB Insurance | Honda Civic Type R | 12 | 23:55.854 | 1:57.403 | 12 |
| 2 | 66 | I | Josh COOK | |
BTC Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 12 | 1.450 | 1:57.597 | 15 |
| 3 | 22 | I | Chris SMILEY | |
BTC Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 12 | 8.275 | 1:58.164 | 1 |
| 4 | 9 | M | Rob COLLARD | |
Sterling Insurance with Power Maxed Racing | Vauxhall Astra | 12 | 8.748 | 1:58.087 | 14 |
| 5 | 11 | M | Jason PLATO | |
Sterling Insurance with Power Maxed Racing | Vauxhall Astra | 12 | 9.598 | 1:58.437 | 3 |
| 6 | 77 | M | Andrew JORDAN | |
BMW Pirtek Racing | BMW 330i M Sport | 12 | 9.873 | 1:58.162 | 6 |
| 7 | 600 | I | Sam TORDOFF | |
Cobra Sport AmD AutoAid / RCIB Insurance | Honda Civic Type R | 12 | 10.272 | 1:58.587 | 4 |
| 8 | 80 | M | Tom INGRAM | |
Team Toyota GB with Ginsters | Toyota Corolla | 12 | 10.465 | 1:58.809 | 23 |
| 9 | 48 | I | Ollie JACKSON | |
Team Shredded Wheat Racing with Gallagher | Ford Focus RS | 12 | 16.985 | 1:58.689 | 5 |
| 10 | 1 | M | Colin TURKINGTON | |
Team BMW | BMW 330i M Sport | 12 | 17.385 | 1:58.376 | 8 |
| 11 | 31 | I | Jack GOFF | |
RCIB Insurance with Fox Transport | Volkswagen CC | 12 | 17.517 | 1:58.259 | 30 |
| 12 | 25 | M | Matt NEAL | |
Halfords Yuasa Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 12 | 18.483 | 1:57.758 | 16 |
| 13 | 3 | I | Tom CHILTON | |
Team Shredded Wheat Racing with Gallagher | Ford Focus RS | 12 | 19.449 | 1:58.927 | 17 |
| 14 | 303 | I | Matt SIMPSON | |
Simpson Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 12 | 20.27 | 1:59.109 | 9 |
| 15 | 4 | I | Sam OSBORNE | |
Exceler8 Motorsport | MG6 | 12 | 20.556 | 1:59.061 | 24 |
| 16 | 27 | M | Dan CAMMISH | |
Halfords Yuasa Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 12 | 21.15 | 1:59.064 | 7 |
| 17 | 12 | I | Stephen JELLEY | |
Team Parker Racing | BMW 125i M Sport | 12 | 21.552 | 1:56.802 | 26 |
| 18 | 28 | I | Nicolas HAMILTON | |
ROKiT Racing with Motorbase | Ford Focus RS | 12 | 26.56 | 2:00.010 | 20 |
| 19 | 37 | I | Rob SMITH | |
Exceler8 Motorsport | MG6 | 12 | 26.912 | 1:58.872 | 28 |
| 20 | 116 | M | Ashley SUTTON | |
Adrian Flux Subaru Racing | Subaru Levorg | 12 | 27.567 | 1:56.805 | 2 |
| 21 | 16 | I | Aiden MOFFAT | |
Laser Tools Racing | Infiniti Q50 | 12 | 33.725 | 1:59.864 | 19 |
| R | 18 | M | Senna PROCTOR | |
Adrian Flux Subaru Racing | Subaru Levorg | 9 | DNF | 1:58.198 | 27 |
| R | 41 | I | Carl BOARDLEY | |
RCIB Insurance with Fox Transport | Volkswagen CC | 9 | DNF | 1:58.511 | 25 |
| R | 24 | I | Jake HILL | |
TradePriceCars.com | Audi S3 | 8 | DNF | 1:57.547 | 10 |
| R | 33 | I | Adam MORGAN | |
Mac Tools with Ciceley Motorsport | Mercedes-Benz A-Class | 7 | DNF | 1:59.500 | 18 |
| R | 15 | M | Tom OLIPHANT | |
Team BMW | BMW 330i M Sport | 6 | DNF | 1:58.915 | 11 |
| R | 8 | I | Mark BLUNDELL | |
TradePriceCars.com | Audi S3 | 6 | DNF | 1:59.674 | 21 |
| R | 32 | I | Daniel ROWBOTTOM | |
Cataclean Racing with Ciceley Motorsport | Mercedes-Benz A-Class | 2 | DNF | 2:00.757 | 29 |
| R | 19 | I | Bobby THOMPSON | |
GKR Scaffolding with Autobrite Direct | Volkswagen CC | 1 | DNF | 2:18.436 | 13 |
| R | 777 | I | Michael CREES | |
GKR Scaffolding with Autobrite Direct | Volkswagen CC | 0 | DNF | N/A | 22 |