Tony Gillham’s Team Hard outfit will run three VW CCs in the 2017 Dunlop MSA British Touring car championship after making a deal to purchase three of the cars run this year by Team BKR.
They were last run by Team Hard in 2013 when they took two podiums before the BMR team took them over but now Gillham’s Kent based team will be re-united with the cars. They will be rebuilt with the assistance of supplier RML to the full current specifications.
Tony Gillham is confident they can be successful again;
“Bringing the VWs to the BTCC was our brainchild back in 2011, [The cars actually first appeared in 2013] so it feels like we have some unfinished business with them,” he said. “It was a good car out of the box then and was still winning races last season with the older kit onboard. Now we plan to update all three VWs to the RML-spec over the winter and believe we’ll have a really strong package.”
He continued;
“We’re coming off the back of a solid year with three older cars, but now we feel we’re ready to step up and become extremely competitive. A number of our staff were also part of the original build project so of course there is a strong bond too. We looked at many options, however, and made this call because we believe they’ll be race-winning machines in our hands. To potentially build and develop new cars at the same time as carrying out the RML upgrades would have been a massive task.”
He also spoke about drivers revealing one is already signed but with no information yet on who it is;
“We’ve already signed one driver, which will be announced in due course, and we’re speaking to further interested parties over the coming weeks in relation to the two vacant seats. It’s great for Team HARD to have secured this deal so early in the winter as it gives us the time required to prepare properly for what I’m sure will be another exciting and successful season ahead for us.”
Team Hard will be running Jessica Hawkins next season in the VW Cup and she will be aiming to eventually graduate to the BTCC with team Hard. If she does she could become the first female driver in the championship since Fiona Leggate’s final season in 2007.
In other news, Silverline BMR Subaru have been testing with James Cole at Donington park suggesting that he will be returning to the team for a second season.
