Darryl O’Young completes the Changan Ford line-up

Former World Touring Car driver Darryl O’Young has signed to race for the Changan Ford FRD Team in this year’s China Touring Car Championship, completing the team’s four-car line-up alongside Rainey He, Andy Yan and Martin Xie.

34-year-old O’Young, effectively replacing Jiang Tengyi at the team, will dovetail his CTCC programme with a sports car racing season in the FIA World Endurance Championship with his old WTCC team bamboo-engineering.

“I have built my touring car experience in the WTCC over the past four seasons, so I’m hoping to bring my knowledge to help the team earn another championship.” said O’Young.

“Many of the drivers in CTCC are very experienced, with both the understanding of the races and also circuit knowledge, so I will have to work very hard with the team to get up to speed. The Changan Ford Racing Team is the most experienced and successful team in CTCC, and I am confident they will provide me with the car and support to succeed. Thank you to Changan Ford and FRD Motorsports for giving me this tremendous opportunity to enter the CTCC.”

O’Young is a key signing to the team admits team boss Paul Hui, who believes his team will have to fight hard to retain its crown from last season, fighting against their main rivals, the Shanghai VW 333 Racing team and also against new technical regulations, which include the introduction of a British Touring Car Next Generation Touring Car (NGTC) inspired formula for this season.

“For 2014, the Federation has implemented a set of very strange technical and sporting regulations which in my opinion is grossly biased towards the previous losing teams,” said Hui. “So as the incumbent championship team, we have to work extra hard and look at all other factors to give us back our winning edge.”