NZV8s Ltd is excited to announce that a Toyota Camry will be the first car to be constructed outside of Ford and Holden for the new generation Gold Star V8 Touring Car Championship, running a Toyota V8 engine.

The opening-up of the BNT backed championship to a wider range of motor companies was announced at a media event at Taupo in March. Since then many interested parties have been working away in the background, putting packages together and we expect to see not only Toyotas on the grid but also the likes of Nissan, Mercedes, BMW and more.

Paeroa dealer, Tony Richards Toyota today confirmed they have purchased two Mitchell Race Xtreme (MRX) space-framed chassis, which will then be fitted with Toyota Camry body panels.

The package will be completed with a Toyota 5-litre V8 engine, developed by TRD (Toyota Racing Developments) in the United States of America. These engines are designed for endurance and have race-proven heritage having run successfully in the Grand-am series in America; making them the perfect engine for the NZV8 series.

Martin Short, from Hamilton, has been announced as the lead driver for chassis #5 which is nearing completion at the MRX workshop. A further announcement in regards to the second driver will be made in due course.

With the engine for the first car in transit from America, once the chassis are completed it will be all hands on deck by the Richards Motorsport team to get the cars finished and ready to begin their testing programmes.

It is our understanding that two other Toyota dealerships are very interested in the new initiative by NZV8s and it’s looking promising that we may have up to four Toyota entries for the 2012-13 championship series.

NZV8s Chairman Ian “Inky” Tulloch is thrilled by today’s announcement.

“The fact that Tony Richards Toyota have come on board straight away and committed to a two-car team is a real endorsement of the direction we are taking the NZV8s category, where any manufacturer can run their own engine and body with our NZ built space-framed chassis.”

“This is just the start of some really fantastic initiatives with the new generation car and category. We look forward to making more announcements in the coming weeks as the series organisers and teams reach a point where they can announce their plans.”

The new series runs through the summer as part of the MotorSport New Zealand race championship series. The summer series is promoted by MotorSport Promotions Limited and features NZV8s, the Toyota International Series, V8 Utes, Suzuki, Production GT cars and a number of new classes to be incorporated into the series this year.