Tom Ingram recovered from a stoppage to set the pace in the opening free practice session of the 2016 Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship season at Brands Hatch.
The Speedworks Motorsport man also earned the unwanted honour of causing the first red flag of the 2016 season, his Toyota Avensis stopping out on track at Graham Hill Bend after 15 minutes.
Ingram’s car was recovered to the pits fairly rapidly, re-joining the field once again when action resumed with 21 minutes remaining.
Mat Jackson‘s brief time at the top of proceedings came to an end at the hands of Matt Neal, the Halfords Yuasa Racing Hondas locking out the top two spots momentarily as reigning champion Gordon Shedden stayed in hot pursuit of his team-mate.
Triple Eight‘s rookie youngster Ashley Sutton had moved up to second spot before a brief on-track moment, before Ingram stunned triple champion Neal with a 48.230s effort that would not be beaten in the final eight minutes.
The Toyota man’s recovery put him 0.087s clear of Honda’s Neal, Rob Collard third quickest at a track he claimed victory at in the season-opening meeting last year.
Sutton returned to the track to finish fourth ahead of a late improvement from Sam Tordoff, Shedden next up while Jack Goff‘s BMW outpaced Josh Cook‘s MG, Andrew Jordan‘s Ford and the Mercedes of Adam Morgan to round out the top 10.
Team BMR‘s four Subarus ventured out on track for a combined 84 laps between the quartet, Colin Turkington best of the bunch in 17th and 0.903s adrift.
Stewart Lines took avoiding action when Mark Howard suffered a spin in his Team BKR Volkswagen CC at Surtees, Dan Welch also having a minor excursion in his Proton Gen-2.
Second practice gets underway at 12:45 this afternoon, and you can keep up with all the action right here and via @TheCheckerFlag on Twitter.
