After all the British Touring Automobile Championship has weathered storms over its existence. That’s inevitable, given it’s been going for 66 years.
Take into consideration a few of the dire fields of the mid-Eighties in Group A days; or the early 2000s when Octagon Motorsport took over the operating of the sequence after shopping for out organising physique TOCA, and the brand new BTC Touring period kicked off with eight automobiles on the grid on the 2001 opener. By comparability with that, what’s occurred through the 2023-24 low season has been extra a passing bathe than full-on thunder and lightning.
From the 27 automobiles that fought out the BTCC in 2023, 9 had been misplaced for 2024 within the types of Group Arduous (six) and One Motorsport (three). However, because of the emergence of recent crew Restart Racing, an additional entry at Speedworks Motorsport, plus the phoenix-like rising from the ashes of Arduous in any case with a just lately introduced duo, the sector stands at 23 – with the potential for yet one more. Whichever manner you have a look at it, that’s hardly a disaster.
“For the final six years or so, I’ve stated loads of instances on the file to those who ideally we should always scale back it to round 24 automobiles for a variety of superb causes, though clearly I might have most well-liked it to be extra gradual somewhat than to occur over one low season,” displays TOCA chief Alan Gow, who returned to the BTCC helm in 2003 after the ill-fated Octagon period.
“However be that as it might, we’re going to be round about that quantity, and that’s the suitable quantity so far as I’m involved. That goes for lots of issues – practicality causes, all becoming in garages if you go to someplace like Oulton Park and all that, but additionally it’s high quality over amount. That’s why Formulation 1 don’t improve their grid to 30 automobiles. Even V8 Supercars – what have they got, 24 automobiles [he’s bang on]?”
Bumper grids are a double-edged sword. It might not have been touring automobiles, however the previous Formulation 3 European Championship is an efficient illustration. Again in 2015, the Max Verstappen impact exploded entries to round 35 automobiles, earlier than it shrunk to 20-odd in 2016 and received killed off by the FIA on the finish of 2018, by which period the common grid was 23 or 24.
TOCA boss Gow says the discount in grid sizes for 2024 is not essentially a nasty factor
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However the 2015 season was the worst within the sequence’ historical past, as a result of driving requirements had been so poor on the crowded tracks, and security automobiles and crimson flags abounded. The 2017-18 seasons, with fields within the low-twenties, had been excellent. Gow isn’t actually a single-seater man, however can relate it to tin-tops.
“While you go to Knockhill or Manufacturers Indy, are you able to think about 32 automobiles in qualifying round there?” he asks. “It’s a nightmare and there are extra issues to go fallacious, ie automobiles in gravel traps and every part else. Now if we find yourself with a higher ratio of high quality over amount, then that’s completely achieved our goals. Job accomplished.
“Additionally, if we’re at 23 – I don’t know what the quantity can be [for 2024] – there’s latitude for one more crew to come back in subsequent 12 months, as a result of when all of the TBLs had been full up nobody might are available in except they purchased a crew and acquired automobiles.”
“I’m not wedded to something for 2027, whether or not we determine hybrid is an efficient factor to have and it would come down in worth or no matter. Definitely the one factor I can let you know is we gained’t be going EV”
Alan Gow
The TBLs, successfully a licence issued by TOCA to run a automobile within the BTCC, had been launched in 2014, initially with 30 of them. Later that decade, Gow allowed a swelling to 32, however has since been back-pedalling, hoping for pure ‘wastage’ (resembling we’ve seen this winter) to cull a number of from the grid for the explanations he’s outlined. With that in thoughts, will he have a most TBL determine for the long run?
“I’ll,” he agrees, “and all of the crew house owners all the time wished the quantity to be decrease, nevertheless it’s the previous story: ‘please decrease the grid numbers however don’t decrease mine’. It’s a choice we will take for subsequent 12 months onwards as to what we’ll set the utmost grid quantity at, and I feel it’ll be 24-ish.
“Even commercially, it’s higher for all of the groups. It simply works for everybody. The massive loser out of it, when you think about how a lot we’re lacking so far as income goes on registration charges, is for me to need to scale back it to 24 seems like I’m self-harming, as a result of I’m purposely bringing down our income, however you do it for one of the best pursuits of the championship, not for my income, in any other case I’d preserve it at 32.”
How a lot is the registration payment then? “About £30,000 per automobile,” Gow replies. “The registration payment has by no means been a problem, as a result of it’s truly actually good worth for cash when you think about.”
Elevated prices from the hybrid system have made it more durable for drivers to seek out budgets, with Bobby Thompson pressured to overlook three rounds in 2023
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The massive beast if you speak to many within the BTCC paddock is the price of the hybrid system, launched for 2022. It’s been partially answerable for budgets being raised, making it more durable for some deserving drivers to safe a seat. The NGTC ruleset underneath which the BTCC runs stipulates five-year contracts for all control-parts provides so, prefer it or not, the Cosworth-supplied hybrid is with us till the tip of 2026. For 2027, there’ll be a brand new ruleset.
Taking into account the World Rally Championship just lately ditched hybrid from its premier Rally1 class for 2025, what’s the considering in BTCC-land?
“That’s a choice we’ll make,” says Gow. “We’re in discussions now with the groups on the brand new laws, planning on what it seems like. I’m not wedded to something for 2027, whether or not we determine hybrid is an efficient factor to have and it would come down in worth or no matter. Definitely the one factor I can let you know is we gained’t be going EV. Whether or not we’ve got hybrid or non-hybrid, or higher hybrid or lesser hybrid, that’s all to play for. A number of it’ll additionally rely upon what else we do with artificial fuels and every part else.”
No matter the price of hybrid, considered one of its largest results has been to reintroduce a purity to competitors that the BTCC had been missing through the period when ballast was used to penalise profitable drivers.
The 2018 season featured a file 17 completely different winners, from which you might solely deduce that there was little kudos from taking a BTCC race victory. As much as and together with 2021, in case you turned up at your native observe and had been a fan of a specific title contender, and he was driving a lazy, heavy previous tank round in nineteenth place as a result of he had 75kg of ballast, then that wasn’t actually a great look.
Over 2022-23, nevertheless, there have been complaints that the restrictions on hybrid use that changed success ballast haven’t gone far sufficient, resulting in processional racing on the entrance. That’s why new sporting laws for 2024 successfully double the ability increase from hybrid and turbo when deployed.
“What I might say to you is wait till you see what occurs this 12 months,” enthuses Gow. “You’re now trying on the thick finish of 60 horsepower on the push of a button. Issues are going to be very completely different.
Gow expects the rise in hybrid increase that may be deployed in 2024 will enliven the racing spectacle
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“If you happen to communicate to these drivers that examined it in September at Snetterton – we took three high drivers and groups [Ash Sutton/Motorbase Ford, Tom Ingram/Excelr8 Hyundai and Colin Turkington/WSR BMW) out there and they tested it and came back saying, ‘Woah, this is going to make a difference’. I think you need to look at how it works out this year, and then come back to me and say you don’t like it.
“Ballast was just a blunt instrument – it really was. Our problem with the hybrid is that the first year we obviously had some reliability issues, and it was a year of learning, and we didn’t get everything right. The second year, last year, we hardly had any reliability issues. So now we could understand what we’d increase and how we’d do it. This is the year when it will actually show its true worth.”
Hybrid, then, is on the table for 2027 onwards. But what will the next generation of BTCC car look like? Probably not much different to the existing NGTC machinery. And there could even be a carryover of pre-2027 cars into the new era.
“You can make a BTCC car out of SUVs and crossovers. If a team or a manufacturer wants to introduce that, bring it on”
Alan Gow
“That’s certainly the aim, to make as many of the current cars as possible viable for an update,” asserts Gow. “I don’t even know why we still call it NGTC – that was only a working title for a new set of regulations. We have a working group with all the teams, and it’s called a New Regulation Working Group – very snappy bloody title! – and that’s what we’re going through now, working out what the new regulations look like and what’ll they consist of. Everything’s up in the air.
“There’s nothing wrong with the current regulations. You’d look at what you can do to make them better, more cost-effective, all this sort of stuff. Every team owner is involved in the NRWG, and it’s exactly the same process that we went through when we came up with NGTC.
“We’d get to a stage where we work out the framework of what the technical regulations will look like, and then you have some more focused technical groups [that’ll be the, erm, Technical Working Group then] to get all the way down to the nitty gritty on these form of particulars. However in the intervening time we’re simply doing the framework of what the automobiles will include.”
Gow will get animated when requested whether or not the web could be broadened from what at present cross as touring automobiles – ie your saloon and hatchback staple weight loss plan. In any case, aesthetically unpleasing as they are usually, SUVs scoff up a big proportion of the new-car market.
New laws are deliberate for 2027, however there are hopes that NGTC machines can be eligible by way of updates
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“You are able to do that now – that is the half I don’t bloody get,” he says. “If you wish to go and run a Vary Rover Evoque, you may. We don’t say in our laws it needs to be a saloon automobile. We’ve got the minimal dimensions of the automobile, and we’ve got the subframes you may bolt on – you may make a BTCC automobile out of SUVs and crossovers. If a crew or a producer desires to introduce that, carry it on. That’s precisely why these laws had been designed the way in which they had been.”
The groups, asserts Gow, are “all 100% behind” persevering with with the present philosophy of spec entrance and rear subframes, at present equipped by RML, onto which the race automobile could be bolted.
“The essential structure they’re very joyful to proceed on with,” he states. “And why would we alter it, as a result of it permits you to take action many issues? That’s why we’ve had such a wide selection of automobiles racing underneath it. Apart from, they’ve all invested their cash into that. And then you definitely would begin to take a look at how one can make it slightly bit less expensive, slightly bit simpler to work on in some areas, simply all the teachings you’ve had from the final 10 years [of NGTC] to make them higher.”
Each entrance and rear-wheel-drive equipment will stay eligible, provides Gow.
“That’s nonetheless within the workings,” he says. “It’s fairly humorous. Bear in mind how the groups used to moan a few years in the past saying the rear-wheel drive’s so a lot better? It was simply individuals sounding off when Dick [Bennetts, WSR BMW chief] was having his purple patch, and now individuals don’t say something in regards to the rear-wheel-drive benefit [after the Motorbase/Alliance Ford Focus steamroller of 2023]. Humorous, that.”
So, TOCA is working with the groups on the brand new laws, however the essential factor right here is TOCA itself remaining in situ to run the BTCC from 2027, and that’s within the energy of governing physique Motorsport UK.
“All of our contracts come up on the similar time – ITV as properly,” factors out Gow. “And that’s three years away, the tip of 2026. We’re nonetheless a good distance away from these contracts ending, so I feel it’s a bit early to be speaking about these.”
Entrance- and rear-wheel drive equipment will proceed to be eligible from 2027
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Sure, however the announcement of TOCA staying on for 2022-26 got here in July 2019. Maintaining to the identical lead time as then provides you… 4 months: “Then I’d higher get a wiggle on! Actually it’s not one thing I’m concentrating on now.”
There’ll be loads of individuals saying there’s no purpose to alter… Gow causes: “That will be my perspective as properly. I can’t think about why anybody wouldn’t need to proceed to have us run the BTCC. We’ve received the runs on the board.”
Ah, the cricketing analogy betrays the Australian. However we’re Brits, we like speaking in regards to the local weather. Not everybody agrees with Gow – “Do you suppose I ought to retire?” the 68-year-old asks, tongue in cheek – however, with him on the helm, these BTCC storms have tended to be averted earlier than they’ve struck land. The sequence has stayed sturdy, nevertheless it does want weatherproofing for the long run.
Gow is aware of he has work to do, however is upbeat in regards to the BTCC’s future
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