Robertshaw Racing has completed its line-up for the 50th anniversary season of the HiQ MSA British Touring Car Championship with the signing of second year driver Matt Allison.
Allison, who won the Renault Clio Winter Cup in 2005 and the British GT Cup title a year later, finished twelfth in the BTCC standings last season and a solid sixth in the Independents' championship in his debut year of touring car competition.
Now the highly rated youngster will join BTCC debutant Harry Vaulkhard at the wheel of a Super 2000 Chevrolet Lacetti, while Robertshaw will also continue to run the BTC-specification Honda Integra of Alan Taylor – who appeared in the final two rounds of the 2007 season.
"I'm really pleased to have got something sorted out," Allison told
Crash.net. "It was getting a bit late in the day, but to be honest with you, I feel I have got a pearl of a drive. I've been to Robertshaw today [Tuesday] and the infrastructure they have in place is really impressive. They have good technical backing as a customer of RML, I've spoken to [Chevrolet WTCC driver] Rob Huff about it and I feel that the car can do good things.
"I've not got a massive budget but the team was prepared to take me on rather than someone with a lot of money because they feel I can mix it with the big boys. I think we can have a really positive year, the Lacetti looks great and is a really good spec. They've had four solid days of running it with Harry and in the end, the deal was all done quite quickly."
Allison is now set to make his debut in the car at the upcoming media day at Rockingham and while that won't leave much time for testing before the season opener at
Brands Hatch, he said he wasn't too concerned.
