Ciceley Motorsport’s Adam Morgan scored his first win of the season in the final British Touring Car Championship race at Thruxton, heading up a BMW 1-2 as Team BMW’s Colin Turkington finished in second.
BTC Racing’s Jason Plato started the reverse-grid race from pole position after the top seven finishers in race two were reversed, with Morgan starting alongside on the front row.
When the lights went out, it wasn’t a great start for Plato and Morgan immediately moved into the lead, with Turkington following into second and Plato dropping down to fifth behind Daniel Rowbottom and Ash Sutton.
NAPA Racing UK’s Sutton then attacked Team Dynamics’ Rowbottom for third at Seagrave on the second lap, gaining the place and opening the door for Plato to follow through back up to fourth.
The action then had to be briefly neutralised, after the BMW of Stephen Jelley was spun by Excerl8 Motorsport’s Tom Chilton at the complex.
The intervention was short-lived when Jelley got his BMW going again, and racing resumed on lap four.
The top three then remained in status quo for the seven laps. Plato, clearly pushing, then pushed too far on lap 11, going wide at the high-speed Church corner across the grass and filling the front of his Honda with grass.
Having thrown away fourth place, Plato had to immediately pit for the grass to be cleared out and he would ultimately finish outside the points as a result.
That promoted Rowbottom to fourth and Plato’s BTC team-mate Josh Cook into fifth, which is where the Honda duo would remain until the end of the race.
Excelr8’s Tom Ingram made limited progress in the race, getting past Jake Hill’s BMW on the opening lap before being on the receiving end of contact from Hill at the chicane on lap seven – forcing both drivers to cut the corner.
Ingram retained his position, and later benefitted when Plato went off, to end the race in sixth.
Hill was less fortunate, the contact damaging his bumper which was left hanging off the back of his car. He continued for several laps before being shown the mechanical warning flag for his dangling rear bumper, being forced to pit to have the offending item removed, dropping him to 21st and out of the points.
Daniel Lloyd completed a trio of top ten results by finishing in seventh behind team-mate Ingram.
Power Maxed Racing’s Michael Crees dropped three places to 15th on the opening lap but fought back to eighth, benefitting from some retirements but also fighting past his team-mate Ash Hand on lap 11 for the place.
Hand himself followed Crees across the line in ninth, whilst the top ten was completed by Toyota’s Rory Butcher, who surprisingly only scored the one top ten finish all weekend.
Team Dynamics’ Gordon Shedden had looked set to finish in seventh, but the Honda driver pulled off at the Complex two laps from the end with smoke billowing from the front-left corner of his car.
It proved to be a miserable weekend for the second NAPA Racing Ford of Dan Cammish, who could only manage 20th to conclude a points-less weekend for the Motorbase driver after he had bene knocked off the circuit in race one.
Jade Edwards also failed to finish, the BTC Racing driver suffering from a front-right puncture late in the race.
Leaving Thruxton, Cook has taken over at the top of the drivers’ standings with 139 points and built a 23-point lead over Ash Sutton in the drivers’ standings, with Turkington now sitting in third a further four points back.
The next BTCC event takes place at Oulton Park in two weeks’ time on 11 – 12 June.
Race result
| POS | NO | CL | NAT | DRIVER | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | BEST | GD |
| 1 | 33 | I |  |
Adam MORGAN | Car Gods with Ciceley Motorsport | BMW 330e M Sport | 17 | 22:49.005 | 1:16.847 | 2 |
| 2 | 50 | M | |
Colin TURKINGTON | Team BMW | BMW 330e M Sport | 17 | 0.599 | 1:16.952 | 4 |
| 3 | 1 | M | |
Ashley SUTTON | NAPA Racing UK | Ford Focus ST | 17 | 1.003 | 1:16.853 | 5 |
| 4 | 32 | M | |
Daniel ROWBOTTOM | Halfords Racing with Cataclean | Honda Civic Type R | 17 | 3.787 | 1:16.939 | 3 |
| 5 | 66 | I | |
Josh COOK | Rich Energy BTC Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 17 | 4.535 | 1:16.965 | 7 |
| 6 | 80 | M | |
Tom INGRAM | Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com | Hyundai i30 Fastback N | 17 | 4.744 | 1:16.793 | 8 |
| 7 | 123 | M | |
Daniel LLOYD | Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com | Hyundai i30 Fastback N | 17 | 7.884 | 1:17.210 | 9 |
| 8 | 777 | I | |
Michael CREES | CarStore Power Maxed Racing | Vauxhall Astra | 17 | 8.168 | 1:16.970 | 12 |
| 9 | 97 | I | |
Ash HAND | CarStore Power Maxed Racing | Vauxhall Astra | 17 | 8.638 | 1:17.244 | 10 |
| 10 | 6 | M | |
Rory BUTCHER | Toyota GAZOO Racing UK | Toyota Corolla GR Sport | 17 | 15.793 | 1:17.577 | 13 |
| 11 | 3 | M | |
Tom CHILTON | Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com | Hyundai i30 Fastback N | 17 | 16.611 | 1:17.344 | 15 |
| 12 | 19 | I | |
Bobby THOMPSON | Autobrite Direct with JourneyHero | CUPRA Leon | 17 | 19.307 | 1:17.233 | 16 |
| 13 | 40 | I |  |
Árón TAYLOR-SMITH | Yazoo with Safuu.com Racing | CUPRA Leon | 17 | 21.837 | 1:17.611 | 19 |
| 14 | 42 | I | |
George GAMBLE | Car Gods with Ciceley Motorsport | BMW 330e M Sport | 17 | 22.151 | 1:17.490 | 20 |
| 15 | 77 | M | |
Sam OSBORNE | Apec Racing with Beavis Morgan | Ford Focus ST | 17 | 24.587 | 1:17.810 | 23 |
| 16 | 12 | M | |
Stephen JELLEY | Team BMW | BMW 330e M Sport | 17 | 28.632 | 1:17.324 | 14 |
| 17 | 16 | I | |
Aiden MOFFAT | Laser Tools Racing | Infiniti Q50 | 17 | 29.028 | 1:17.549 | 25 |
| 18 | 48 | M | |
Ollie JACKSON | Apec Racing with Beavis Morgan | Ford Focus ST | 17 | 30.580 | 1:17.992 | 28 |
| 19 | 21 | M | |
Ricky COLLARD | Toyota GAZOO Racing UK | Toyota Corolla GR Sport | 17 | 31.087 | 1:17.781 | 17 |
| 20 | 9 | M | |
Dan CAMMISH | NAPA Racing UK | Ford Focus ST | 17 | 37.286 | 1:17.131 | 18 |
| 21 | 24 | M | |
Jake HILL | ROKiT MB Motorsport | BMW 330e M Sport | 17 | 37.541 | 1:16.882 | 6 |
| 22 | 62 | I | |
Rick PARFITT JR | Uptonsteel with Euro Car Parts Racing | Infiniti Q50 | 17 | 1:05.089 | 1:18.765 | 27 |
| 23 | 96 | M | |
Jack BUTEL | Bristol Street Motors with EXCELR8 TradePriceCars.com | Hyundai i30 Fastback N | 16 | 1 Lap | 1:17.996 | 29 |
| 24 | 11 | I | |
Jason PLATO | Rich Energy BTC Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 16 | 1 Lap | 1:16.800 | 1 |
| 25 | 52 | M | |
Gordon SHEDDEN | Halfords Racing with Cataclean | Honda Civic Type R | 15 | 2 Laps | 1:16.994 | 11 |
| R | 99 | I | |
Jade EDWARDS | Rich Energy BTC Racing | Honda Civic Type R | 14 | DNF | 1:17.783 | 21 |
| R | 17 | I | |
Dexter PATTERSON | Laser Tools Racing | Infiniti Q50 | 12 | DNF | 1:18.287 | 26 |
| R | 20 | I | |
Will POWELL | Autobrite Direct with JourneyHero | CUPRA Leon | 7 | DNF | 1:19.587 | 22 |
| R | 28 | I | |
Nicolas HAMILTON | Yazoo with Safuu.com Racing | CUPRA Leon | 5 | DNF | 1:20.893 | 24 |