Vauxhall Insignia to Join the BTCC Fray

With 13 different models from 10 manufacturers and 27 fielded cars, the British Touring Car Championship has never been so diverse, but it looks like there’s room for one more, as the Insignia 4-door saloon will also join the fray soon, according to autosport.com.

General Motors’ British division, Vauxhall, is already well represented, with the Griffin marque having already claimed six drivers' titles, six teams' titles and eight manufacturers' titles since the turn of the millennium. But now, a NGTC-spec Insignia looks set to appear in the Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship in 2011 with new team Thorney Motorsport.

Team boss John Thorne has announced that his team is preparing to enter a pair of Insignias for the season finale at its home circuit of Silverstone, October 14th, although the cars could be fielded at the penultimate round at Brands Hatch’s Grand Prix on October 2nd.

"It's been a dream of mine for many years to run in the BTCC. We've come close in the last two years and the new NGTC regulations are just too good to ignore. As a team we always built our own cars and the new regs allow both the budget to be kept reasonable as well as allow some engineering flair that we can thrive on," Thorne said.

Thorney, which operates 60 performance garages across the UK, may opt to develop its own engine or else use the spec engine package offered by series organizers TOCA. The larger form of the Insignia should be offset by its improved aerodynamic drag coefficient, according to the team boss.