Bennani to drive new Honda in 2014

Morocco’s motorsport star Mehdi Bennani and Proteam Racing will switch to a Honda Civic car for the 2014 WTCC season.

This will increase Honda’s presence in the championship to four Civic cars in 2014 technical specifications, in addition to those run by JAS Motorsport for Gabriele Tarquini and Tiago Monteiro and the one by Zengö Motorsport for Norbert Michelisz.

Proteam Racing principal Valmiro Presenzini commented: “After ten years as a BMW customer team, we are truly excited and honoured to be welcomed in the Honda racing family. We are fully confident that Bennani will be able to deliver some impressive performance at the wheel of the new Civic.”

And Bennani echoed: “Throughout the current season I think I proved that I am capable of
achieving excellent results and fighting for the top positions. I claimed three second places and four victories in the Yokohama Trophy, And I had close fights for the overall victory with the likes of Tarquini, Coronel and Huff. I am very excited now to make another step forward and being entrusted one of the most competitive cars in the field.”

William De Braekeleer, Motorsport Manager at Honda Motor Europe, explained : “Since Honda
joined WTCC, it has always been our wish to support the championship further by allowing private teams to have access to our cars. Because of next year’s new technical regulations, the championship needed as many "2014 specs cars" as possible and it was therefore in line with our philosophy to make a fourth 2014 Civic WTCC available for a private outfit. Needless to say that we are particularly pleased that an agreement could be made with an experienced and successful squad like Proteam and we can’t wait to see Mehdi showing his great talents at the wheel of the new Civic !”