The British Touring Car Championship returned to action at Croft after a six week rest to recharge the batteries. Ash Sutton had been the star of the opening half of the season and he held a six point lead over Tom Ingram in the standings. However, the previous meeting at Oulton Park had been the first time this season that a NAPA Ford had not won a race, after they had won nine of the previous twelve, with a BMW taking the chequered flag each time. Would NAPA return to form in North Yorkshire?

Qualifying – Dan Cammish, Dan Rowbottom, Ash Sutton, Josh Cook, Colin Turkington

NAPA made it six pole positions out of six this season, with Dan Cammish taking the honours for the second time. Teammates Dan Rowbottom and Ash Sutton backed him up too and there was a strong showing from Josh Cook to take 4th. BMW pair Colin Turkington and Jake Hill, fourth and third respectively in the championship, completed the the third row of the grid ahead of Ingram. 

Race One, 3/10 – Dan Cammish, Ash Sutton, Dan Rowbottom

• With each driver having to use each tyre compound across the day’s races, Cammish and Rowbottom started on the supposedly favoured softs, with Sutton and Cook opting for the medium tyre. 
• The top six remained in position at the start of the lap, but Turkington lost places to Hill and Ingram before the first circuit was completed. 
• By lap 4, Cammish had a good gap, but Sutton was close to Rowbottom, as he was for the rest of the race, before Rowbottom let him by on the final lap.
• Although Ingram pressurised Hill, he couldn’t find a way by and there were a queue of cars behind behind the One Motorsport cars of Cook in 4th and Aiden Moffat in 9th, who was 13 seconds away from eighth. While Cook held on, Moffat eventually lost out on the hard tyres.
• At the front, Cammish cruised to victory as NAPA retained their 1-2-3 from qualifying in a relatively uneventful race.

Race Two, 3/10 – Ash Sutton, Dan Cammish, Dan Rowbottom

• For this race, Sutton and Cook started on the soft tyres, with Cammish and Rowbottom opting for mediums. The soft tyre grip helped Sutton get the better front row start and he was ahead of Cammish by the first corner. The rest of the field did well to avoid a cannon balling Moffat across the grass and then the track, while Ingram moved up to 4th.
• Sutton quickly scampered off to an incident free 7.6s victory from Cammish, who was comfortable in second too. Rowbottom, however, was needing to defend stoutly from Ingram who had managed to hold off Cook’s challenge. 
• The BMW trio of Hill, Turkington and Stephen Jelley closed up to battle for third, but to no avail. In trying to pass Cook for 5th, Hill ran over the gravel, and as such, dirty tyres contributed to his self made spin on lap 10 as he lost several positions in one of the race’s few incidents. 

Race Three, 4.5/10 – Colin Turkington, Tom Ingram, Josh Cook

• There was minimal change for the reverse grid draw as ball 6 of Turkington was selected by Sutton and he was joined at the front by Cook as all of the top six started on hard tyres. 
• An eventful start saw Turkington get away well and he managed to just hold off Cook and then Ingram, who passed Cook, on the opening lap. Behind Turkington, there was drama for Sutton as he went for a small gap on the inside of Jelley, but drove his front wheel into Jelley’s rear, resulting in terminal damage for both of them. Although Sutton tried to limp back to the pits, he fell just short causing a safety car. 
• As racing resumed on lap 5, Turkington defended well for a lap and half, seeing off Ingram’s challenge, before settling down for a relatively comfortable 14th victory at Croft. 
• Down the pack, there were incidents for Sam Osborne after contact with Jack Butel and Tom Chilton who stopped out on track. Hill was trying for some time take 5th from Rowbottom, and with a couple of laps remaining, sent himself into a spin after getting too close and running on the grass, in a near carbon copy of his incident in race two. 
• Although race three was better than those that had preceded it on the day, it was still far from a classic touring car race.

After a six week absence, BTCC fans would have been hoping for greater entertainment than that served up at Croft. When we have seen the use of the three tyre compounds before, it has been to great effect, but with there seemingly being minimal difference between the softs and mediums at Croft, it meant that it didn’t really add to the racing. With the majority of the field opting to use the hard tyre in the final race, it meant that once again, there wasn’t much difference in performance between the cars. 

Croft used to favour rear wheel drive cars, but following the resurfacing towards the end of 2019, there hasn’t been the difference that there used to be. The front wheel drive NAPA cars certainly returned to form, if you could even consider Oulton Park to be a dip, with a double 1-2-3. 

For the second meeting in a row, Sutton has had a DNF in race three after going for potentially unrealistic gaps on the road. As such, it means that the gap between him and Ingram at the top of the standings remains at six points, although Turkington has moved up to third following another win at his favourite circuit, although they have been hard to come by in recent years. 

Sutton is still in the prime position to add another championship crown to his BTCC career, given his and his car’s performance this season. However, he will need to keep his car in one piece and if he were to not finish a race one, that could have a bigger impact on his challenge. It may be that Sutton needs to think of the longer game from now until the end of the season, something that he seemed to do in his final Infiniti season.

Next up is the annual trip north of the border to Knockhill, where NAPA will be hoping to keep up their 100% qualifying record. However, the rear wheel drive cars have traditionally gone well there in the past, so will that continue or will the NAPA Fords continue to dominate 2023?

2023 BRITISH TOURING CAR CHAMPIONSHIP STANDINGS AFTER 18 RACES:

1.	Ashley Sutton	258 points
2.	Tom Ingram	252
3.	Colin Turkington	224
4.	Jake Hill	217
5.	Dan Cammish	212
6.	Josh Cook	164