ASH SUTTON ‘I AM DESPERATE TO PROVE I AM NO ONE-SHOT WONDER’
Ash Sutton has won British Touring Car Championship races in the wet and in the dry. He has won them in front-wheel-drive cars and rear-drive ones. And he has won in three different models of car.
The 2017 title winner has already proved he is adaptable, and this year he has got his teeth into a new programme with the Laser Tools Racing Infiniti Q50, which is backed up by BMR Engineering. The combination has taken the unfancied car to new heights with victories and what is turning into a very credible challenge for a second tin-top title for the Bishop’s Stortford man.
Sutton has been the spearhead of a new generation of BTCC racer, a man whose take-no-prisoners attitude is a hit with the fans. His level of success is already remarkable for someone who is only in his fifth year at this level.
He has managed to get the measure of any team-mate he has been partnered with, and that includes BTCC stalwart Jason Plato at Subaru. But it is this fresh challenge with Laser Tools Racing that is shining the spotlight on another part of his skill set as he helps the engineers unlock the best from the rear-wheel-drive car. He took time out of his schedule at Silverstone last weekend to tackle the MN readers’questions.
Question: When you started off in your motor racing career, was your aim to reach Formula 1?
John Charles
Via email
Ash Sutton: “I suppose when I was a kid and I first got into motorsport, yes it was. It is the same as any kid I guess, and that lasted up until I was about 10 years old. When you get a little bit older, it is not that you get wiser, it was more the fact that you just understood what money is and where it can get you. You start to realise that it is not an unlimited pot.As a family, we were never really fortunate enough to be in the position where money was no object for us. We had to think realistically. I had been karting, but Formula 1 was such a long way off and we had no means of getting there. We realised pretty soon that we had a far more of a chance to make a career in touring cars and to actually get on one than we would have done anywhere else.”
And so you started your career in Formula Vee, but that didn’t
