THE car to be used by Swindon’s HMS Racing team in this year’s Dunlop MSA British Touring Car Championship has been revealed to the motorsport world by race-winning driver Rob Austin and team principal Simon Belcher.

And the eagerly-awaited Alfa Romeo Giulietta, resplendent in white and green, turned plenty of heads as it was showcased on the opening day of the Autosport International Show at Birmingham NEC.

Austin and HMS also announced an enhanced commercial partnership with long-standing backer Duo, resulting in the team being entered in this year’s BTCC as Duo Motorsport with HMS.

“We are so proud to finally be unveiling the new Alfa, everyone in our team has put in an incredible amount of work to keep the project on schedule while maintaining an impressive attention to detail,” said Austin.

“We also have to give a huge amount of credit to our fantastic technical partners, this is a very unique BTCC car and both Willie Poole Motorsport Services and ABS Motorsport have really gone above and beyond.”

The team is now relishing the opening weekend of the new season on April 7&8 at Brands Hatch – the venue for Austin’s history-making first win for HMS during the 2017 championship finale.

Belcher added: “Our engineer Matt Taylor and the rest of the team have done an incredible job and I am extremely proud of what we have achieved. However, a beautiful car is only part of the journey – now we need to make it win.”