2008 British Touring Car Championship

Reigning champion Fabrizio Giovanardi remained on board, being joined by Matt Neal, returning to Vauxhall for the first time since 2002 after leaving his family-run Team Dynamics squad, with whom he won back-to-back titles in 2005 and 2006.

Jason Plato, who came extremely close to securing a second BTCC title the previous year, remained on board, as did GT convert Darren Turner.

Mat Jackson returned in his 320is after a successful debut season in 2007, with his small family-run operation now enjoying BMW Dealer Team UK backing.

Motorbase Performance also joined the BMW brigade after ditching their SEAT Toledos, with former Independents champion Rob Collard returned to the series full-time with the team after spending most of 2007 away.

Also leaving the Toledo behind for 2008 were GR Asia (again running under the Team Air Cool banner), who switched to a newer Leon (which ran with its original petrol engine unlike the works cars) for the returning Adam Jones.

BTC Racing began the year running their temperamental Lexus IS200s from the previous two seasons, before switching to a pair of SEAT Toledos acquired from Motorbase from the second round onwards.

He ran a BTCC-spec Honda Civic Type-R, originally built and run by the works Arena operation between 2002 and 2005, with his family-run In-Tune Racing team.