1999 British Touring Car Championship season

BTCC season
Previous = 1998
Current = 1999
Next = 2000

The 1999 British Touring Car Championship season was won by Laurent Aïello in his debut season driving for the Nissan works team, with team mate David Leslie in second place.
Rickard Rydell, the 1998 champion came third, with James Thompson and Jason Plato coming 4th and 5th.

One of the big stars and big surprises was the independent driver Matt Neal. Driving for his fathers Team Dynamics in a 1998 Nissan Primera, Matt became the first independent driver to win a championship race in the feature race of the first Donington round. TOCA had put up a reward for £250,000 for this achievement which Matt duly claimed.

Changes for 1999

For the 1999 season both the works teams of Peugeot and Audi had departed since competing in the previous year. Indeed this would prove to be the last year for Renault, Volvo and Nissan, the three previous champions from the last three years. The BTCC would never see more than four works teams together in one season again. Night racing was introduced to the BTCC for the first time for the rounds at Snetterton in July. The pit lane and main spectator areas were floodlit, whilst other parts of the circuit were in total darkness. To aid the drivers eyesight for the sharp changes from light to dark, the cockpits had a soft red light glowing inside.

Entry list

Circuits and calendar

Donington Park, April 5th

Silverstone, April 18th

Thruxton, May 3rd

Brands Hatch Indy, May 16th

Oulton Park, May 31st

Donington Park, June 20th

Croft, July 4th

Snetterton, July 17th

Thruxton, August 1st

Knockhill, August 15th

Brands Hatch Indy, August 30th

Oulton Park, September 12th

Silverstone, September 19th

Drivers' Championship table

Points System

The points system used for the 1999 British Touring Car Championship was as follows. For the drivers championship, 15 points were awarded to the winner of each race, 12 to second place, 10 for third and 8,6,5,4,3,2,1 for fourth to tenth place respectively. At the end of the season, drivers would drop their four lowest scores. A point would be awarded to the driver who achieved pole position for each race, and a point was awarded to anyone who led the feature race.

For the manufactures championship, the same amount of points for the top ten finishing positions were awarded as for the drivers championship but only a manufacturers two highest placed cars were able to receive points. At the end of the season, manfuacturers would drop the points from their worst four rounds of the championship. No points were received for leading laps or pole position. [Vic Lennard (Editor). Auto Trader British Touring Car Championship - Donington Park Offical Programme. (1999) p.30 The Really Motoring Group.]