Tony Gilham will make his return to the British Touring Car Championship at the wheel of a Geoff Steel Racing-prepared BMW 320. Gilham, who lost his seat at Triple Eight prior to the Knockhill meeting, has been working flat-out to find a replacement drive for the final three meetings of the year.
For Rockingham Gilham’s car will be normally-aspirated. However the team are looking at putting a turbo powerplant in the former Motorbase machine.
Gilham, 32, admitted that he is particularly pleased to be returning to the series, having already scored points in his début season. His return also conicides with the launch of his own garage in Kent.
“I’m delighted I’m coming back,” said Gilham. “Once you’ve done the BTCC you don’t want to do anything else really. I’m just opening my own garage under the Tony Gilham brand in Kent and that has led to some great new sponsors who want to build their image as well – the BTCC is the right place to do that.
Former racer Martyn Bell, now the team manager at GSR, is looking to ensure that the small team are the first to put a turbocharged two litre engine in a BMW in the BTCC. Indeed the team have already done much work on placing a turbocharged unit in one of their two cars and the outfit are looking towards a two-car entry in 2012.
“Tony’s car at Rockingham will remain normally-aspirated but will then switch to the Next Generation Touring Car turbo engine for Brands Hatch and Silverstone,” said Bell. “Turbo-charging is the way forward and we’d actually very much like to run both cars with turbo engines at the last two rounds to showcase them for 2012.”
TCN apologises for the delay in reporting this important news.