Autosport International, the annual expo for the motorsport industry in the Uk gets underway for four days on Thursday.
The news from the show, initially at least is likely to be dominated by announcements from BTCC teams.
WSR (Recently known as Ebay Motors) the current title holders will be revealing at least one new driver and a new sponsor. Andy Priaulx has been mentioned in rumours and team boss Dick Bennetts has suggested it’ll be a big name.
It’ll be the first chance to see Andrew AJordan’s new Pirtek Sponsored MG as the 2013 champion moves from his family run Eurotech team to the works 888 Racing MG squad taking most of his sponsors with him. It’s possible we may hear an announcement also from Eurotech on what their plans will be without Jordan leading the team.
The new Infiniti Supported team, Support our Paras racing will be showing off their colours for the first time. Most of the BTCC content will be based around an exhibition on the Dunlop stand. As well as cars from WSR, Infiniti and Andrew Jordan’s new MG, the stand also feature’s Rob Austin’s Audi, Sherman. Elsewhere around the show will be Aiden Moffat’s new Mercedes on the Laser tools/Pop Bang Colour stand and Simon Belcher’s Toyota Avensis on the Handy Motorsport/Karcher stand.
BTCC Drivers present will include all those mentioned in the above news plus Matt Neal, Gorden Shedden and Colin Turkington. It’s possible we’ll see further drivers from the BTCC around during the four days of the show.
Ginetta, whose products provide two of the support races to the BTCC, will be returning to the show this year after missing the 2014 show.
Other big names at the show include David Coulthard, Anthony Davidson, Allan Mcnish, Petter Solberg to name but four.
The BTCC won’t be the only exhibition on display. Other exhibits include the F1 Racing Grid, Wales Rally GB feature, special 60 Years of Motorsport News collection and a unique collection of Track Icons and Wild Road Cars presented in association with Classic & Sports Car Magazine and Silverstone Classic.
As usual there will be many stands from various motorsport manufacturers, championships and racing clubs all the way from low budget entry level all the way up to higher level racing.
Another favourite, the indoor arena will return once again in 2015. In the setting of the largest indoor race track in the UK, the live action arena will showcase fast road cars and even faster racing.
The performance car show will, as usual be held alongside with entry tickets to one show allowing entry to both exhibtions. We’ll be reporting on all of this year’s big news and attractions over the weekend.
The first two days of the show on Thursday and Friday are trade only but Saturday and Sunday are the public days.
Tickets to Autosport International are available from £32 for adults, with children’s tickets priced from £21 and children under five years admitted for free. For tickets, visit www.autosportinternational.com. By Marc Waller
