Turkington extracted 'the maximum possible' in Q1

Team BMW's Colin Turkington admits qualifying 15th for today's opening British Touring Car Championship race was the best he could have hoped while carrying full success ballast at Snetterton.

The current championship leader will have to fight his way back through the field from 15th, while his closest title rival Tom Ingram will start the opening race from fifth on the grid.

Despite struggling in 15th during qualifying one, however, Turkington's West Surrey Racing BMW came alive during the ballast-free Double Diamond second qualifying session, where the former two-time champion enjoyed a far more competitive run.

Turkington spent much of the one-off 15-minute shootout firmly in contention for pole position. However, his best lap of a 1 minute 55.400 was erased after the Team BMW driver was penalised for exceeding track limits at turn three during that lap.

“Coming into the weekend with the maximum success ballast was always going to make things tough and qualifying 15th for Race One was the maximum possible," said Turkington.

"The big positive is that with the weight taken out for second qualifying, the pace was great and I did a lap good enough for the front row.

"Unfortunately, I had it taken away for going over the track limit on one corner by what wasn’t more than an inch or two, but at least my next lap was good enough for eighth and I can definitely race from there.

"It’s double points for Race Three so it’ll be very important to get as good a result as I possibly can.”