Biography

Honda first entered the BTCC in 1991 as the family-run Team Dynamics outfit. The father-and-son pairing of Steve and Matt Neal has gone on to achieve incredible success – in 1999, Matt became the first Independent race-winner in the Super Touring era, and Team Dynamics hasn’t looked back since.

Team Dynamics received official Manufacturer support from Honda for the first time in 2010 and began competing under the Honda Yuasa Racing banner in 2012. The squad’s impressive tally of BTCC titles includes five overall Drivers’ and six overall Teams’ championships, from more than 500 race starts.

Gordon Shedden claimed Drivers’ glory with Honda Yuasa Racing in 2012 and came tantalisingly close to successfully retaining it in 2013. A switch from the Civic hatchback to the new Civic Tourer model for 2014 presented Dynamics with a different challenge – but as ever, they were still firmly in contention and making history with the first podiums and wins for an estate-style car in the BTCC.

2015 was another historic year for Honda in the series as the hotly-anticipated Civic Type R piloted by Neal and Shedden sped to the Manufacturers’ laurels, with the Scot clinching a second Drivers’ crown in dramatic fashion in the final race.

The pair partnered each other for the seventh successive campaign as Halfords returned to the Honda Racing fold in 2016, and at the end of a nail-biting season, Shedden lifted the laurels for the second consecutive year in the Brands Hatch GP finale, with team-mate Neal only ruled out of title contention in the same meeting by a sizeable impact with the circuit barriers.

Now both triple champions, the pair remain on-board in 2017 and with an intensive winter testing programme under their belts and a chassis-engine-driver combination proven many times over, there is no reason to believe Halfords Yuasa Racing’s challenge will in any way weaken. The newly-liveried stealth black Civic Type R with signature orange flashes is certainly the car with the target on its rear bumper.