Ash Sutton: ‘The day went to plan’

Ash Sutton says his race day ‘went to plan’ on Sunday after he came from 13^th on the race one grid to score a trio of top ten results, including a 100^th career podium in the British Touring Car Championship.

Sutton started the opening race down in 13^th after failing to progress from his Q1 group, having led the championship going into the weekend and therefore been given the least amount of TOCA Turbo Boost [TTB] on Saturday.

The NAPA Racing UK driver admitted that was probably where he should have been in the circumstances and elected to race with the less favourable hard compound tyre in Sunday’s opening race to get his challenging circumstances out of the way all at once.

Nonetheless moving up three places, for race two Sutton had both the soft tyre and the benefit of boost for half of the racing laps, which he used to good effect to claim a podium in third.

Starting from seventh in the reverse-grid final race, the 31-year-old was in the thick of the action in the early laps, batting around fifth or sixth before gaining two places in quick succession towards the end of the race to claim fourth at the finish.

“It was a good turnaround considering qualifying,” said Sutton to TouringCars.Net. “The day has gone to plan.

“We tried to get rid of the pain all in race one and made some progress, which was good. I made a bit of a comeback in race two, although I was held up a bit with the safety car which hindered some progress.

“But I still got a podium. Celebrating 100 podiums whilst we’re celebrating 100 years of NAPA is quite cool.

“In race three we needed to score some points, so it was good to make progress and come forward three places.

“There was a big chunk of boost being used around me at the start of the race, which stopped me settling into my own rhythm.

“Once they all matched us on the boost side of things we were able to crack on and in the last few laps we came through and overtook a few more guys.

“Initially we got beaten up to an extent, which was because they were deploying when we couldn’t.

“Overall, it’s a solid amount of points.”

Sutton expects his continued lack of turbo boost to be a challenge at the next round at Snetterton in just under two weeks’ time.

“It’s a good place to be [leading the championship]; you’re never going to turn it down. Going to Snetterton the [boost] deployment is going to make a big difference there.

“It’s not ideal but I’d definitely rather have the points than more button pushing!

“I’m pleased with how we’ve come out of the weekend despite our qualifying.”