BTCC: Ingram wins race 1 at Oulton Park to snatch championship lead from Sutton

Tom Ingram took victory in the opening race of the Oulton Park race weekend after an excellent lights to flag victory.

Ingram would get away well while Restart Racing's Chris Smiley would struggle in comparison as he would lose out to both Dan Cammish and Ash Sutton on the opening lap dropping him to fourth.

Meanwhile, a collision further back between Stephen Jelley and Sam Osborne would end up bring out a Safety Car haulting the action.

At the restart, Cammish would try to stick with Ingram while Sutton and Smiley was hot on his heels as racing resumed. Max Hall would have an unfortunate end to his race as he would end up with damage as he had a broken rear tow link.

Back up front, Cammish and Ingram would start to trade fastest laps for a few laps before Ingram began to open up the gap further.

James Dorlin and Josh Cook would start battling on lap 9 before Dorlin had to shortcut the chicane ultimately leading to him maintaining the position.

The battle for 5th between Tom Chilton and Adam Morgan on lap 10 would see Chilton come out on top between the two Team Vertu teammates, allowing Chilton to set off after the three in front of him.

Daryl DeLeon, Árón Taylor-Smith and Aiden Moffat would fight hard on lap 11 before contact saw Moffat spin round and drop a few places.

On lap 12, Cook would finally get passed Dorlin for 9th place while Lloyd behind him had made up places from last place to 12th heading into the final quarter of the race.

On the final lap of the race, Smiley would manage to get back by Sutton for the final podium spot.

Out front, Ingram would come home in first ahead of Cammish and Smiley who rounds out the podium and takes another Independents Trophy win.

Sutton and Chilton would round out the top 5 ahead of Morgan, Jake Hill, Senna Proctor as well as Cook and Dorlin.

This would mean Ingram would take the championship lead by a single point to Ash Sutton as with two races to go this weekend, can Ingram maintain and extend his lead by the end of the day or will Sutton reclaim the top spot?