page_title: Vauxhall Motors
section_title: Motorsports
hierarchical_section_title: Vauxhall Motors / Motorsports
caption_attribution_description: Tom Chilton driving for Vauxhall at the Oulton Park round of the 2007 British Touring Car Championship.
context_page_description: Vauxhall Motors Limited is a British Automobile manufacturer, subsidiary of French car manufacturer Groupe PSA and based in Chalton, Bedfordshire, England.
  Vauxhall's vehicle lineup is identical to that of Opel, but the Vauxhall brand is exclusively used in the UK. Vauxhall is one of the oldest established vehicle manufacturers and distribution companies in the United Kingdom.
  Vauxhall sells passenger cars and light commercial vehicles under the Vauxhall marque, and formerly sold vans, buses, and trucks under the Bedford Vehicles brand. Vauxhall has been the second-largest selling car brand in the UK for more than two decades.
  Vauxhall was founded by Alexander Wilson in 1857 as a pump and marine engine manufacturer. It was bought in 1863 by Andrew Betts Brown, who began producing travelling cranes; he named the company Vauxhall Iron Works. It began manufacturing cars in 1903. It was acquired by American automaker General Motors in 1925. Bedford Vehicles was established as a subsidiary of Vauxhall in 1930 to manufacture commercial vehicles.
  It was a luxury car brand until it was bought by General Motors who thereafter built mid-market offerings.
context_section_description: Vauxhall has competed successfully in several forms of motorsport.
  During the 1970s Vauxhall had a strong presence on the British rallying scene.  The Magnum coupe was heavier and less powerful than the dominant Ford Escort, but still put up some strong performances in the hands of drivers such as Will Sparrow and Brian Culcheth.  From 1976, Vauxhall decided to heighten their profile in the sport by building a homologation-special version of the Vauxhall Chevette, known as the Chevette HS.  This was a much more serious contender, and in the hands of drivers such as Pentti Airikkala, Tony Pond, Russell Brookes and Jimmy McRae it and its successor version, the Chevette HSR, won many events in Britain and Europe.  Airikkala won the British Rally Championship in a Chevette in 1979.
  The Chevette was retired in 1983, and effort was concentrated for the next few years on the Group B Opel Manta 400.  However, the Vauxhall Astra and Vauxhall Nova were campaigned in the lower power classes during the mid-1980s, and became popular amateurs' cars thanks to their reliability, ease of tuning and ready supply of parts.  After the banning of Group B in 1986 the Group A Astra returned to the forefront.  As a two-litre, front-wheel-drive car it was unable to challenge the four-wheel-drive cars for outright victory, but did score top ten placings on several World Championship events.  Louise Aitken-Walker won the ladies' World Championship in 1990 in an Astra, despite a serious accident on that year's Rally of Portugal when her car rolled down a hillside and into a lake.
  During 1991–92 serious consideration was given to campaigning the four-wheel-drive version of the Vauxhall Calibra in British and possibly world rallies, and a trial version contested the 1993 Swedish Rally in the hands of Stig Blomqvist.  However, the cost was judged prohibitive, and in any case the 'Formula 2' category had been introduced into British rallying.  The latest version of the Astra was an ideal contender, and won the category in the 1993 and 1994 championships, driven by David Llewellin.  Vauxhall campaigned successive versions of the Astra in the British championship until the late 1990s.
  Vauxhall first entered the British Touring Car Championship with the Vauxhall Cavalier in 1989.  The lead driver was John Cleland, who remained with the team until his retirement in 1999.  The Cavalier was competitive, and often the fastest front-wheel-drive car in the series, and Cleland was second in the title race in 1992, and then fourth in the following two years.  In 1995, however, he won the title (adding to his 1989 title win in an Astra).  The Cavalier was replaced by the Vectra for 1996.  Yvan Muller was sixth in the 1999 British Touring Car Championship and fourth in 2000.
  In 2001 the BTCC regulations changed and Vauxhall brought the Astra Coupe into the BTCC. The Astra would dominate the BTCC between 2001 and 2004 with the drivers title won by Jason Plato in 2001, James Thompson in 2002 – 2004 and Yvan Muller in 2003. Vauxhall also won the Manufacturers Award and Teams Award every year also.
  In 2005 the Astra Coupe was replaced by the Astra Sport Hatch however it was not as competitive as the Astra Coupe and restricted success for Vauxhall in 2005 and 2006.
  In 2007 The regulations changed again and Vauxhall brought the Vectra back. The Vectra brought success back to Vauxhall after Fabrizio Giovanardi won the 2007 and 2008 BTCC championship. Fabrizio Giovanardi finished 3rd in the championship in 2009 before Vauxhall pulled sponsorship out at the end of 2009 due to and the economic crisis and lack of official manufacturers in the BTCC.
  In November 2016 it was announced that Vauxhall would return to the BTCC in partnership with Power Maxed Racing. It was later announced that former BTCC and WTCC driver Tom Chilton would lead the team with Senna Proctor as his teammate. The team earned a podium at their first meeting of the year at Brands Hatch, and their best finish was a 2nd at Silverstone, with Rob Huff standing in for Tom Chilton.
  2018 saw the team return as TA
caption: Tom Chilton driving for Vauxhall at the Oulton Park round of the 2007 British Touring Car Championship
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