|
After the 2022 season, I think Ash Sutton has now surpassed Alain Menu and Colin Turkington to become the greatest BTCC driver I have ever seen (which means back to 1991 - I haven't seen anywhere near enough of Andy Rouse or Jim Clark as a BSCC driver to compare him to them).
Sutton had gained a bit of a reputation as a RWD specialist after his shock championship in 2017, destroying teammate Jason Plato, then continuing to work wonders in relatively uncompetitive Subarus in the following years while his teammates were nowhere, winning the championship with Infiniti on his first go, and then dominating in 2021, usually ahead of the very quick Aiden Moffat even with 75kg of success ballast.
Then he returned to FWD in 2022, paired with a driver who had showed himself to be one of the best on the grid by twice going into the final round of the season as a title contender in 2019-20, Dan Cammish, and totally wiped the floor with him. Cammish had a lot of bad luck but he wasn't in the same league as Sutton. With Ollie Jackson and Sam Osborne also having particularly poor seasons, it seems as though the Ford wasn't a particularly good car and yet Sutton dragged it into title contention. His racecraft also stands out with that brilliant defence in Brands Hatch when he lost the turbo and against Jake Hill at Knockhill where the BMW was dominant.
He might be flattered by his excellent engineers who follow him wherever he goes, but I think I would now rate Ash Sutton as the best BTCC driver of the modern era. He will rip up the record books if he remains in the championship.
|