John Filippi upgrades to TC1 Chevrolet for 2015

Corsican driver John Filippi will stay in the FIA World Touring Car Championship for a second season, now moving up from the defunct TC2T class, where he raced a SEAT León WTCC last year for the Spanish Campos Racing squad, to a new Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1, understood to be one of three cars that the team will field this season.

19-year-old Filippi took part in every race in the 2014 season for Campos, scoring one victory in the Yokohama Drivers’ Trophy in Japan, and finishing second overall in the class, though was generally outpaced by the more experienced Franz Engstler and his BMW throughout the season in the category for the previous generation cars.

Filippi tested in Barcelona this week in the car previously raced by Dusan Borkovic, with the Serbian having departed the team to join Proteam Racing for this season. TouringCarTimes understands however that Filippi will in fact drive a new-build Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1 this season, with the team still to confirm their third driver.

This could potentially bring the total number of Chevrolet Cruzes on the grid to eight, with ROAL Motorsport fielding two cars, Campos three, Craft-Bamboo confirming one car so far, and Münnich Motorsport running at least one car for team principal René Münnich, with the team also owning a second car which was driven by Gianni Morbidelli last year.

“I intend to build on my experience last year, although many circuits that I learned in 2014 will no longer be on the 2015 calendar, but the new tracks will be new to almost everyone,” said Filippi to the French ToileF1 website.

“If I look at what Valente achieved last year, with 12th place in the championship despite several races where he was unfortunate, a top 12 late in the season would be a satisfactory result. I am pleased to continue the adventure with the Campos team, which has a lot of expertise in the field. In addition, I still working with my engineer who had accompanied me last year in TC2, and with whom I get along well. I’m looking forward to the start of the first race.”