Sutton moves towards BTCC crown with race two victory

Ash Sutton moves one step closer to claiming this season's British Touring Car Championship drivers' title after winning an enthralling wet-dry second race at Brands Hatch.

Track conditions had dried enough for the majority of the field to elect the slick tyre for the second race, however, a handful of runners, including BTC Racing's Tom Chilton, still opted for the wet tyre, which created a topsy-turvy opening half of the race.

Indeed, Chilton romped into a healthy lead ahead of Sutton, but the slick tyre running Infiniti Q50 began to come back at the race leader as early as lap five.

Sutton ultimately scythed past Chilton on lap nine of the race, while Motorbase Performance's Andy Neate, another to run the wet tyre, fell down the order from third on lap 11.

With all of the main title protagonists running dry rubber, the race began to form a more consistent picture with Tom Ingram powering back up into second position, ahead of Honda's Dan Cammish and Colin Turkington in third and fourth.

By that point, Turkington had already survived a number of scares and was carrying a small amount of front-right bodywork damage, which was rubbing against his BMW's front-right tyre.

Despite Turkington's front-right tyre concerns, the reigning champion went on the attack and kept his hopes of winning a record-breaking fifth BTCC title alive after making a sensational move for third place ahead of Cammish on the penultimate lap of the race.

The Team BMW driver took advantage of Paul Rivett's heart stopping spin on the exit of Paddock Hill corner by turning an evasive manoeuvre into opportunistic move past Cammish, who stood on the brakes to avoid hitting Rivett's stricken Audi S3.

That remained the only change of the podium order with Sutton enjoying a near five-second winning advantage over the Toyota Gazoo Racing Corolla of Ingram in second.

Sutton superbly controlled the race at the head of the field and set the fastest lap by 0.1s ahead of Turkington, earning him an all-important extra championship point in the process.

As it stands, Sutton will carry a nine-point lead ahead of Turkington into the last race of the season, while Cammish fell out of title contention with his fourth place finish.

Motorbase Performance's Ollie Jackson finished fifth for the second race in succession ahead of Adam Morgan on his final weekend with the Mercedes A-Class machine.

Jake Hill was seventh for MB Motorsport, while Senna Proctor, Josh Cook and Rory Butcher completed the remainder of the top-ten order.