Three British Touring Car Championship titles in just six seasons. At 28, Ash Sutton is something of a modern-day motor racing phenom, which makes him a worthy recipient of Autocar’s Motorsport Hero award this year.
Especially since, among the many remarkable things about him, he’s not even a full-time racing driver.
“I have a simulator business that I run Monday through Friday,” Sutton says of the business he started just as the world went into lockdown amid the pandemic and demand for virtual racing systems. was about to explode.
“It’s manic at the minute. Business is getting better and better year after year. Eventually it will get to a point where I can take a step back and let go of the reins a bit. That’s the goal, and then I can focus a bit more on the race. I work seven days a week, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m.
Imagine what he can accomplish when racing is his only concern… Having made his BTCC debut in 2016, Sutton won his first title a year later in a BMR-run Subaru Levorg, then added back-to-back crowns in a Laser Tools Racing. Infiniti Q50 in 2020 and 2021.
He has now upgraded to a Motorbase Ford Focus ST and is trying to equal the record four crowns held by legend Andy Rouse and chief rival Colin Turkington.
If it can pull off the feat, it will also prove its versatility, having switched from rear-wheel drive to front-wheel drive for the first time since that debut season in 2016.
“I am young in terms of my BTCC career,” he says. “No driver has won it in a front and rear wheel drive car so it would be nice to tick that one off. Winning the most championships under my belt by the end of my career is the ultimate goal. We are already a long way off on this path. Six years and three titles, it’s not a bad percentage. As long as we can maintain that, we continue.
Like most racers of his generation, Sutton started out in karts, aiming for a single-seater life, only to have budget constraints change his path. But the BTCC is a destination unto itself, and it has no burning desire to race anywhere else.
“It suits me and it goes back to my karting days,” he says. “Having three races a day is like having three heats and a final in karts. You don’t have to be the fastest driver on the grid, but you can fight your way to the front. It’s just about that consistency. I feel like it clicked with me.”
In truth, he doesn’t seem to be in a rush to give up the day job either.
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Source: www.autocar.co.uk
This notice was published: 2022-05-10 21:31:23
