100th World Touring Car Championship race for BMW

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100th World Touring Car Championship race for BMW

The FIA World Touring Car Championship (WTCC) this weekend travels to Porto (PT) for the 99th and 100th races since the series made its comeback in 2005. BMW has unquestionably been the most successful manufacturer in the championship.

Eighteen years after BMW driver Roberto Ravaglia (IT) scored the first WTCC title in 1987, Dirk Müller (DE) registered a hat-trick (pole position, fastest lap and overall victory) for BMW on 10th April 2005.

To date the manufacturer has claimed a further 37 wins, with Sergio Hernández (ES) adding his name to the winners’ roll by occupying the top step of the podium in Brno (CZ) for BMW Team Italy-Spain. BMW Team UK’s Andy Priaulx (GB) was crowned world champion three times after winning consecutive titles between 2005 and 2007. While the driver from Guernsey in the Channel Islands won his first title with a BMW 320i, it was with the BMW 320si WTCC, introduced in 2006, that he won the others. Priaulx is the only driver who crossed started every race to date.

“BMW has an excellent record in the World Touring Car Championship,” says BMW Motorsport Director Mario Theissen. “Over the past five years 12 drivers have represented the BMW national teams, and celebrated innumerable successes. Naturally our world titles in 2005, 2006 and 2007 were the highlights, and we will do everything in our power to add another chapter to our success story this year. The series provides a good platform for our Customer Sport programme, as BMW privateers are able to race wheel-to-wheel against our national teams. It is surely no coincidence that a BMW driver has won the privateer classification three times since 2005.“ www.girlracer.co.uk