Honda To Race The Civic In The FIA WTCC

Honda will participate in the FIA World Touring Car Championship (WTCC) with the Euroepan version of the latest Civic.A “totally new” engine will be used for this endeavor and for this project, Honda has entered into a joint partnership with Mugen and J.A.S. Motorsport. Honda R&D is creating a bespoke racing engine, while Mugen will manufacture and maintain it. J.A.S. Motorsport will create the race vehicle utilizing the new Honda Civic 5 door built in Honda’s Swindon (UK) manufacturing facility. The racing engine will be a 4-cylinder 1.6-lite, turbo-charged direct injection petrol engine, which will be in line with the Super 2000 regulations of the FIA.
The ambition of Honda is to participate in the WTCC as early as this season with a series of “inaugural rounds”. Talks are ongoing with the FIA. However, these rounds would include Japan to be held on October 21, 2012 at Honda’s Suzuka circuit, and then followed by Macau and China. Honda will enter a two-vehicle team managed by J.A.S. Motorsport into every race in the 2013 championship season. This endeavor is being run independently by the Honda Racing British Touring Car Championship winning team. Three-time BTCC Champion Matt Neal as well as Gordon ‘Flash’ Shedden will run the race-prepared Team Dynamics variant of the new Civic. They will be lining up on the grid at Brands Hatch on this April 1 for the first race of this year’s season.