Yokohama Celebrates 100 WTC Races in “Incredibly Busy” Motorsport Year
Japanese tyre manufacturer Yokohama celebrated its 100th race as official tyre supplier to the FIA World Touring Car Championship earlier this year, having supplied the control tyre to the series since 2006. Commenting on the season, Yokohama HPT’s Motorsport manager, Mark Evans, said: “We’ve seen another exceptional year of competition in the WTCC, which is a superb environment to showcase the brand’s performance.” The ADVAN wet and dry racing tyres have drawn critical acclaim from the competitors, with the manufacturer developing products that suit both the front and rear wheel drive cars competing.
Though certainly one of the more high-profile series, WTCC is not the only motorsport activity the manufacturer has been involved in: “2010 has been an incredibly busy year for Yokohama in motorsport, both on a global level and here, in the UK,” comments Evans. In rallying, the brand is an official partner to the Eurosport-run Intercontinental Rally Challenge and in September, celebrated with the Turkish all-female crew of Burcu Cetinkaya and Cicek Guney. Burcu has run Yokohama tyres on her Peugeot 207 S2000 all season and on the penultimate round, Rally of Scotland, became the first female driver in the history of the IRC to score a driver point. “We’re delighted that Burcu claimed her first driver points before the end of the IRC season, which is particularly impressive given the level of competition in the series,” said Evans.
Yokohama also partnered the two works Aston Martins at this year’s Nürburgring 24-hour race, including the near-showroom specification Rapide. The Lotus OnTrack series, using Yokohama control tyres, also made several visits to mainland Europe during the season. The organising body of Oval Racing in the UK, BriSCA renewed its relationship with Yokohama as well this year, deciding to continue using the brand for a further three years as control tyre in the Formula Two category, as well as the Stock Rod and Lightning Rod classes.
Yokohama tyres are also widespread in the UK, in various formulae. The 750 Motor Club, for example, uses the brand as control tyre for five of its series, including the UK’s largest one-make series, the Stock Hatch Championship. Numerous other series continue to thrive, in partnership with Yokohama, including one-make series for Caterham, Morgan and Minis as well as series north of the border in Scotland, such as the Scottish Classic Sports, Scottish XR2s and Minis. The brand also features on the Suzuki Swift Sport one-make series, running as part of the British RallyCross Championship.
“Here in the UK, we have once again worked very closely with all the organisers of the series we supply and I’m delighted that many of these have been going from strength to strength this year. I’m also very pleased that the RX Racing rallycross buggies will once again be fitted with Yokohama tyres as they support this year’s Race of Champions, to be held in Düsseldorf in December. All in all, a very good year for Yokohama in motorsport,” concluded Evans.
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