When BTCC was good

I remember going to Brands to watch the BTCC when Cleland and Allam raced for Vauxhall and there was the tank of a car the Volvo 850.

Was great fun, shame that it has changed so much nowadays, never really got back into it.
 
I'm still a ffan and rememebr getting soaked at the first Scottish BTCC in 1991 !
I go to Croft every year as well to see them.
Was better then, in the days of the "Supertourers", but it was even better before that with the mighty RS500's, 560bhp and rwd, brilliant circuit racing.
 
i'd love them to bring back the proper touring cars instead of the hatchback racing they have now - and to relax the rules a bit and cheapen the series to encourage more manufacturers.
 
I was at that race, standing somewhere on the Craner curves as I recall. That was a fantastic time for touring cars, no question of that, but I preferred the era's before that when it was Rovers vs Capri’s, and the ETCC Jaguar, Volvo, 635csi, Capri and Rover battles, now that was exciting, just before the turbo's and M3's came to the fore. I have a video somewhere, of Gerhard Berger at the old Brno circuit, not the crappy one they use now, the old road circuit that wound its way up into the hills around the town, and then back down again, and it’s astonishing to watch. He is running about 150mph, coming down into the town from the hills, through a fast sweeping section of road in a works 635csi in a constant drift to drift, missing the barriers by millimetres, simply lovely to watch. Those cars were great in the video, but give me 4 wheel drifts and RWD, without any form of wing or spoiler any day. I feel privileged to have been lucky enough to watch racing back then, the current modern formulas are not a patch when it comes to noise and excitement; technology has killed the fun in most formulas.
 
used to watch it here too :(


Although my memorys of Mansell were him moaning about other drivers knocking him out of the way
 
This picture will show you what I mean!

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James Weaver spent most of the season like this, they even named a dug out gully on the outside of Woodcote bend at Silverstone, Weavers Trench, because each time he came out of the chicane like that, his left rear was on the grass!
 
I still prefer the Primera/A4/Mondeo/V40/Accord/Vectra/406 era to anything, including the days of the Sierra RS500.

They were just so similar in looks, and power (iirc?) which made it fair, brilliant to watch racing.
 
does anyone remember (i think it was) keith o'dor flipping a primera end over end 3-4 times, clearing the trackside fence? Will Hoy's securicor?? toyota carina? Tarquini's alfa 155 with the wing of victory? the great audi 4x4 fuss?
 
I used to watch the BTCC in the mid-late 90s, but stopped watching it the last few years since a lot of the teams dropped out, e.g. Ford, Audi, Nissan etc.
 
I dunno, went to 4 BTCC weekends last year and loved every minute. For £20ish for 9am-5pm you cannot grumble, even my lady enjoys it. Miss the saloons though, loved Toca 1&2 on the playstation
 
I started spectating at Saloon car racing in 1979, and pretty much spectated at all of the major Saloon car events in the UK until the late 80's, when other stuff like beer and women took over most weekends, though I still attended fairly regular until mid 90's I suppose. Group 1 and early Group A for me everytime. The 2L era had some great racing, but the cars were winged, FWD in the main and mundane, with a crap noise. Don't get me wrong, fantastic racing, but missing something compared to the older cars for me, and by older I mean the generation before the RS500's and M3's.
 
I don't watch any-more. Success ballast was the final straw for me, Same reason I don't watch ETCC/WTCC.

I loved the 98 season, Mansel can certainly drive. 94 was good too.
 
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