Collard worried about BMW pace in the BTCC

Rob Collard is looking at returning with West Surrey Racing for the 2011 season, but has voiced his concerns that the BMW 320si is not likely to be competitive in the BTCC.

Of the three teams that raced a BMW last season, Motorbase Performance have already switched to the independents’ title winning Ford Focus ST built by Arena Motorsport with Mountune developed turbo engines.

Forster Motorsport have put up for sale one of their chassis and have yet to confirm their 2011 plans, which could leave just West Surrey Racing to run the car which dominated the WTCC between 2005 and 2007 and won the British Touring Car Championship in 2009.

Speaking to TouringCarTimes, Collard voiced his concerns about the BMW, with the majority of the field now switching to the turbo-charged NGTC specification engine, with RML the only other front running team with a non-turbo unit.

“I’m talking very closely with West Surrey, the BMW’s a fantastic car to drive, however we need to try and improve the power performance of the BMW as it’s a little bit lacking in that department at the moment,” said Collard.

“Last year was a very difficult year trying to race against the Focus and the Chevrolet, both of which had a considerable amount more power than us.”

“At the moment, there’s no plan to run a turbo engine and we’re waiting for TOCA to look at some way of assisting the power performance of the BMW, and until that point, I’m not in a position to race a BMW and I don’t think it’s a competitive car in its current form.”

If Collard does return with WSR, it will be his fourth season with team which won their first overall title in the BTCC with Turkington in 2009, and the independents’ championship four times in the last decade.

“I’m very keen to stay with WSR because they’re a fantastic team and I like them a lot – I’ve had lots of years racing with them, and the BMW is a great car and I’ve shown I can be a very quick rear-wheel drive driver and I want to stay that way. But unless we get some decent dispensation the car’s not competitive so what’s the point in racing them?”

BMW is offering an upgrade package to teams that run the BMW 320si in the WTCC, which will see the car run with a 1.6 litre turbo charged engine built to the new World Engine regulations, but these engines aren’t permitted in the BTCC.

The three options for a BTCC team running a BMW car are to run the existing 2.0 litre normally aspirated engine as WSR are expected to. To build a 2.0 litre BMW based turbo to the NGTC regulations, or to run the TOCA engine developed by Swindon Racing Engines, which will be used by Pirtek Racing, Speedworks Motorsport and also likely to be used by Dynojet Racing this season.