Silverstone BTCC: Sutton heads MG 1-2 in Race 1

Ingram got the jump at the start and led the opening six laps, but Sutton was never far behind and forced his MG 6 down the inside of the Toyota Avensis at Luffield on lap seven to establish a lead he would never lose.

The closing Cook had passed Andrew Jordan's Motorbase Performance Ford Focus at Becketts on lap five and then tapped Ingram to pass at Luffield on lap 12, but Sutton was able to hold him off to win by just under a second.

While the action was frantic at the front, it was a race where the championship contenders struggled. Both of the Team Dynamics Honda Civics of Matt Neal and Gordon Shedden were hit by punctures, meaning West Surrey Racing's Sam Tordoff managed to extend his championship lead despite only finishing 13th.

Behind the top three, Jordan had a fairly lonely run to fourth, with Handy Motorsport's Rob Austin getting the better of Ciceley Racing's Adam Morgan to take fifth.

Team Hard's Jake Hill was a superb seventh in his Toyota Avensis ahead of Team BKR's Aron Smith, with West Surrey Racing's Rob Collard the highest of the championship contenders in ninth and Team BMR's Colin Turkington a superb 10th from the back of the grid.

The crowds were treated to the usual high-speed trains of cars on the Silverstone National circuit, happily without major incident.

However, lap 20 saw a very near miss when Martin Depper and Collard made contact exiting Copse and tagged Aiden Moffat into a huge tank-slapper. The BMW and Mercedes both recovered but Depper exited stage right minus a wheel, which the chasing pack narrowly avoided.

Tordoff now leads Neal by eight points with five races left in the season, with Shedden 23 back in third and Collard 27 behind in fourth.

He jumped Motorbase Performance's Mat Jackson, who trailed home 19th after a strong early part of the race.

Revised Race 1 results - Top 10:

Pos	Driver	Car	Laps	Time	Delay
1	Tom Ingram	Toyota	22	21'49.891
2	Andrew Jordan	Ford	22	21'53.369	3.478
3	Rob Austin	Toyota	22	21'57.355	7.464
4	Adam Morgan	Mercedes	22	22'00.012	10.121
5	Jake Hill	Toyota	22	22'06.461	16.570
6	Árón Smith	Volkswagen	22	22'08.022	18.131
7	Rob Collard	BMW	22	22'08.198	18.307
8	Colin Turkington	Subaru	22	22'08.322	18.431
9	Aiden Moffat	Mercedes	22	22'08.445	18.554
10	Jason Plato	Subaru	22	22'08.676	18.785