The Road Tourism, the most popular category of national motorsport, announced this Wednesday a historic turn: from next year the Japanese Toyota will join, which will run with the Camry model, and thus will join the legendary poker of brands composed by Ford , Chevrolet, Dodge and Torino.
The motorization of the Camry, the model with which it already participates in the Top Race V6 category, will be with the impellers that the category provides, the Cherokee multivalves.
“The Executive Committee of the Corredores de TC (ACTC) Association received, on October 4, 2021, the official request from Toyota Argentina -signed by its President Mr. Daniel Herrero- to participate in Road Tourism with the Toyota Camry model “the category reported through a press release.
“The same, which was sent to the Board of Directors of the ACTC, was dealt with and approved unanimously in the meeting held yesterday (Tuesday), at 6.30 pm, at the Institution’s headquarters. The joint objective will be to work from both parts so that, in the 2022 season, Toyota can be inserted as the fifth brand on the Road Tourism calendar, “the announcement concluded.
Rossi-Barrichello?
The Japanese brand, with Gazoo Racing, already intervenes with official teams in the SuperTC 2000, the TC Pick Up, the National Tourism and the aforementioned Top Race.
Its top figure is the Brazilian Rubens Barrichello, former Formula 1 driver, remembered for being Michael Schumacher’s teammate at Ferrari, who already got into a TC Torino earlier this year for a test. The team also has Matías Rossi, who left the TC in 2019.
Barrichello and Rossi could then be the first Toyota drivers in the most convincing category of national motorsports, although the possibility of Andrés Jakos, one of the youngest drivers of Road Tourism, or the talented Jorge Barrio, current leader of the Pinar del Río, is also mentioned. TC 2000 and the F-Renault.
The reactions
“I see it as something more than positive, I have never seen such a big change and it is so good. My whole litter never saw a Ford or a Chevy on the street, we do it with Mustangs, Camaro or Camry, they are the cars we like, and what more beautiful than to see them in the best category in Argentina “, he said. precisely Jakos in dialogue with the Campeones program.
In social networks, the fierreros were divided between joy and -the most traditionalists- anger, while some pilots had quick reactions: “Hello Camry, come here we are going to show you how many pairs are three boots,” wrote the entrerriano Martín Put.
“I am a Ford fan, a Ford driver and I will never leave the mark in the TC, but how great that the ACTC joins a brand like Toyota. A news!” Added the Uruguayan Mauricio Lambiris.
And to the objection of a follower, he replied: “It seems to me that we should not stay. I think it is a step forward. It will not change the essence. The Ford, the Chevy, the Dodge and the Torino will continue to be what they are and will continue to exist the same rivalry of a lifetime “.
A little history
The first TC race, made official in 2009 in the Guinness Book of Records as the oldest motorsport category on the planet, was on August 5, 1937, the triumph of Angel Lo Valvo. That year the champion was Eduardo Pedrazzini.
The rider with the most titles in history is the legendary Juan Gálvez, with nine; and among those who are active is Guillermo Ortelli, Chevrolet emblem, with seven (the last in 2016).
In the mid-1970s, the presence of its four emblematic brands stabilized: Chevy (Chevrolet), Falcon (Ford, although it also participated with the Fairlane model), Dodge (GTX) and Torino (IKA Renault). From 2022 there will be five …
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