On his second WTCC season, James Nash clinched the Yokohama Drivers’ Trophy, beating his bamboo-engineering team-mate Alex MacDowall.
At the wheel of his Chevrolet Cruze car, the young Englishman established himself among the championship’s top drivers from the beginning of the season. Fast and consistent, Nash was capable of winning two overall races (Salzburgring and Porto) and finished on the podium on three other occasions.
Eventually this helped him to claim a brilliant third place in the WTCC Drivers’ Championship, the best result ever for a non-factory driver.
“We came with a plan to secure the Yokohama Trophy title and if we could, a top three overall too. To have achieved both is simply fantastic! I drove a controlled opening race. I knew what I had to do which was to stay ahead of Chilton and with that in-hand there was no need to try anything ahead. I simply had to concentrate on bringing the car home in the points. The second race though, was pretty dramatic. I got ahead of Thompson off the grid and tucked in behind leader Coronel going down to the first real corner but then I could see all hell breaking loose in my mirrors as quite a few cars smashed into each other and blocked the track. I think had the race not been stopped I would have been good for a podium at least but the two rolling starts that followed rather mucked things up for me,” a delighted Nash commented.