NEWS ARCHIVE

Japanese racer Yukinori Taniguchi will replace Harry Vaulkhard at bamboo-engineering in the next three WTCC events at Oschersleben this week, Valencia and Okayama. Team principal Richard Coleman commented: “While it’s sad to see Harry go it’s a great opportunity for us to work with Yukinori, his experience at the Okayama circuit will no doubt help us as a team when we get there.”

Chevrolet WTCC drivers Alain Menu and Yvan Muller will take part in the 200 Km of Buenos Aires, a round of the Argentine TC2000 Championship, on November 7th. Muller and Menu will be at the wheel of Chevrolet Vectra cars run by the Chevrolet Elaion team, teaming-up with Guillermo Ortelli and Christian Ledesma respectively.

The BMW Team RBM look forward to this weekend’s event in Oschersleben with a lot of confidence coming from nine victories out of the ten WTCC races held so far at the Motorsport Arena. Team principal Bart Mampaey said: “In Brno Andy was able to reduce the gap in the Drivers' Championship to 16 points. We obviously want to continue this positive trend. Oschersleben has always been a successful stomping ground for BMW, but it will be important to get good starts in both races.”

The FIA WTCC Race of Germany, that will take place in one week time at Oschersleben, was launched yesterday at Magdeburg’s Allee Center, the largest shopping mall of the Sachsen-Anhalt capital city. On Saturdays the centre attracts approximately 35,000 visitors. The actual launch took place at 11.00 am on the first floor of the shopping mall, with Eurosport commentator Uwe Winter asking questions to drivers and other guests.

The Chevrolet team are facing the most difficult racetrack. Never so far a Chevrolet car has managed to win a WTCC race at Oschersleben. And yet the team come to Germany with the strongest determination to keep the lead in both the Drivers’ and Manufacturers’ championships. In view of the German event, Chevrolet spent three days testing in Magny-Cours. “We have prepared well, and the test we made in Magny-Cours was very useful to further fine-tune some technical options,” explained Yvan Muller.

Taiwan’s Kevin Chen completed his first laps in a WTCC car last Tuesday at Mugello, driving a Proteam Motorsport BMW 320si. Chen – 31 years old from Taipei – will join the Italian team for the two final race meetings of the season at Okayama and Macau. Chen will test again this weekend at Magione, together with Fabio Fabiani who will make his third WTCC appearance of the year next week at Oschersleben.

Rounds 15th and 16th of the FIA WTCC will take place next week in Germany, at Oschersleben’s Motorsport Arena on September 5th. The German track, located in the Bode region some 30 km from the city of Magdeburg, is a traditional venue for the FIA Touring Cars having hosted the European Touring Car Championship from 2001 to 2004 and the World Touring Car Championship from 2005. The WTCC meeting is also one of the fans’ favourites as it usually attracts large crowds.

Rounds 17 and 18 of the 2010 FIA World Touring Car Championship will take place at Valencia, Spain, 18th and 19th September. The deadline to apply for media credentials is Tuesday, 7th September.

Applications for Media Accreditation for the 57th Macau Grand Prix and rounds 21 and 22 of the FIA World Touring Car Championship are now open. The deadline to apply for media credentials is Friday, 22nd October.