Tony Gilham to run Volkswagen Passats in 2013 BTCC

The Volkswagen Passat will be the latest car to join the British Touring Car Championship after Tony Gilham confirmed he plans to build an NGTC version for 2013.

Gilham's team already intends to run an S2000 Honda Civic and two NGTC Vauxhall Insignias next season and has now added an NGTC Passat programme.

"We have taken delivery and started the build on our latest NGTC project, which is VW Passat CCs to run alongside the Insignias," Gilham told AUTOSPORT.

He plans to start testing in February and add a second Passat ahead of the start of the 2013 season.

"The long-term plan is to run at least two," he added.

Bit suprised by that to be honest. I know its the CC version but the Passat seems a odd choice for the BTCC. Maybe they don't want to harm the image of the Golf and scirocco by not winning

I would have thought the scirocco was the perfect shape for BTCC

 

It's good news to see another different model in the BTCC. At the moment there is a greater tendency towards bigger saloon cars in the sport, things like the Avensis and Insignia and this is just part of that.

It will be interesting to see how long it takes to get them up to speed as some of the new NGTC cars have taken the best part of a year to get anywhere near the front-running pace. Having said that the latest addition, the new Focus, just took a few rounds to start winning.