 The final qualifying session of the season brought the first non Vauxhall pole-position of the year, with an impressive Warren Hughes putting his MG ZS on pole for the feature race. Yvan Muller took the top spot for the sprint race, and was second behind Hughes for the feature. This means that he takes two more valuable championship points, as Hughes, and indeed the whole MG team are not elligible for championship points, having only joined the series for the final three meetings.
Muller's title rival, and Vauxhall Motorsport team-mate, Jason Plato took second spot on the grid, alongside Muller, for the Sprint, but could only manage 4th for the Feature. This means that going in to the final two races of the year, there are only two points separating the two contenders for the Touring class title, and with a maximum of 35 points to be had from the two races, either could emerge victorious. The races are guaranteed to be tension-filled, with a mistake from either driver likely to end their hopes of leaving Brands Hatch as 2001 BTCC champion.
In the Production class, a jubilant Paul O'Neill took his first pole position of the year (with the same grid formation being used for both sprint and feature races), and will be hoping to improve on his best finish of the season - a 2nd place at Silverstone. Behind him, there is of course a championship to be decided. Alongside O'Neill on the front row of the grid is Team Kaliber/Barwell's Simon Graves, whilst his team-mate, James Kaye, one of three who could take the title, could only qualify sixth on a rapidly drying track. Kaye's rivals for the championship, the HTML pairing of Harrison and Moen, qualified in in 3rd and 9th positions respectively. Just as with the Touring class, the battle for the Production title is going to be intense, and once again, mistakes will be devastating - but there can only be one winner!
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