WestCoast Racing working hard to build Gianni Morbidelli a new Honda Civic

Gianni Morbidelli crashed hard in the second race at Buriram, Thailand. The Italian’s car was destroyed in the accident, which forced the team to start an emergency procedure to build a new car for the former Formula 1 driver.

The team had to order a new chassis from car builders JAS, which was delivered yesterday to Sepang at an Asian workshop of the Italian touring car powerhouse. The shell was subsequently transported to Singapore and arrived today, along with the spare parts ordered by the team including a new engine.

Morbidelli’s old car also arrived today, and the team stripped it with the equipment from Thailand in a workshop by the docks of Singapore. The plan is to have the car ready for Monday to send all the material to the Marina Bay paddock.

“It’s a race against the clock and we hope we can stick to the schedule”, said team manager James Nixon. “We need to thank JAS Motorsport for supplying the chassis and parts in time despite the short notice, and SEL Logistics that took care of the transportation. Without them we wouldn’t be able to attempt this.”

The retirement at Buriram means Morbidelli is now 54 points off the lead in the championship and, with three race weekends to go, he is desperate to get some good results in order to fully get back in the championship battle.