Mercedes in the BTCC

rdjones · 2 Feb 2005, 21:34 (Ref:1215925)

There is an interesting interview in today's Motorsport News with Tim Sugdan, where he says that Mercedes Benz where going to enter the BTCC at the end of 1993.

The plan was to do the last 3 rounds of the 1993 season, before stepping up to a full prorgam in 1994. The project was top secret, but was not given the green light.

The car was going to be entered by Prodrive, but it was to be built by AMG in Germany and developed by Bernd Schneider.

It would have been interesting to see too who the Prodrive run Mercedes Benz's would have shapped up againest the Alfa's, BMW's etc of that era.

alesi95 · 3 Feb 2005, 00:26 (Ref:1216060)

I remeber this at the time rumours were that they were developing for 95 Btcc. But I think the expanded ITC killed off such ideas.

kmchow · 3 Feb 2005, 01:32 (Ref:1216079)

I heard rumors of such a project as well. Someone gave me a picture of a C Class. But I've since lost the picture. But looking back, I'm not sure if it was a ST or DTM C Class that I was looking at?? I vaguely recall seeing a ST-ish spoiler on the back, but then if it was '93, there were no spoilers back then??

racer69 · 3 Feb 2005, 09:35 (Ref:1216209)

There were some Mercedes in the Australian Super Touring Championship, read this thread http://tentenths.com/forum/showthread.php?t=64078

I also recall hearing about this, but from what i remember there was a car already built, and tone of the story was that it was a forgone conclusion. I'll have a look at some of my magazines from around that time and see what i can find.

Surely any BTCC program for Mercedes-Benz would have teamed with an assault of the SuperTourenwagon Cup.

Andy Metcalf · 3 Feb 2005, 09:39 (Ref:1216213)

It would be interesting to see one in the pack with current regs.

**touringlegend** · 3 Feb 2005, 21:38 (Ref:1216915)

There's probably a bigger chance of that happening since one has been built for the STCC. It'd be a car I'd love to see on the grid.

BillyT · 4 Feb 2005, 18:21 (Ref:1217593)

It would be great to have one on the grid. Did the plans for a World Touring Car cup ever materialise?

supertouring · 5 Feb 2005, 09:55 (Ref:1218029)

Tim was a Prodrive contracted driver (drove the ProDrive BMW) and was targeted for the seat if it came off, hence he did not have a drive in the BTCC that year.