Butcher dominates race three to secure home win

Motorbase Performance's Rory Butcher takes a triumphant home BTCC race victory after dominating an incident packed final race of the day at Knockhill.
Butcher dominates race three to secure home win

Motorbase Performance's Rory Butcher takes a triumphant home British Touring Car Championship race victory after dominating an incident packed final race of the day at Knockhill.

The home hero started the reverse grid from second position alongside Senna Proctor but immediately powered ahead of the Hyundai to take what would turn out to be an unassailable lead.

Twice Butcher would get away ahead of pole-sitter Proctor after the race quickly became red-flagged following a heavy multi-car shunt involving Ollie Jackson, Mike Bushell and Sam Osborne.

With the incident occurring as early as lap two, the officials took the decision to restart the race in original grid order. Butcher produced what looked to be a carbon copy of his original getaway from the line in second, and once again took the lead away from Proctor before turn one.

However, Butcher's start is under post-race investigation, meaning the Ford Focus ST driver's victory remains provisional at this stage.

Nevertheless, Butcher quickly charged away from the Excler8 Motorsport Hyundai i30N to eventually romp home to a near five-second win over Proctor, who in turn took his best result of 2020 in second.

Tom Chilton gave BTC Racing some reason to cheer on what turned out to be a difficult day for the Honda squad after taking his first podium finish of the year in third. Chilton successfully held off Team BMW's Tom Oliphant, who settled for fourth ahead of Jake Hill in fifth.

Honda's Dan Cammish scored further points in sixth, while Chris Smiley valiantly held onto seventh ahead of an impatient multi-car queue headed by Aiden Moffat in eighth.

Championship leader Colin Turkington looked set to challenge Smiley for seventh during the final few laps, but the Team BMW driver slipped back behind the Infiniti of Moffat to finish in ninth ahead of Tom Ingram in tenth.

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