Nick Halstead rules out EXCELR8 return in 2025

Nick Halstead has ruled out a return to EXCELR8 Motorsport for the 2025 British Touring Car Championship season.

The 52-year-old has spent the past two seasons with the Hyundai squad however he has announced that that will not extend into a third successive campaign.

Halstead made a one-off appearance with the team in 2021 before securing a full-time seat in 2023. That year would see him clinch a career-best finish of seventh place at the Donington Park season-opener.

This past season saw Halstead continue to chip away in the UK’s premier motorsport series, tallying a hat-trick of points finishes over the course of the year.

In a statement in social media, Halstead wrote: “Firstly to keep things simple I am not returning to EXCELR8 – I have loved every minute of my BTCC time and I can’t say enough about how much of a family I have felt, and with Marv & Sandra running the show on the weekends it’s been an absolute pleasure.

“Plus my mechanics’s and race engineer have been incredibly supportive, we all strive for results up and down the grid and they’ve still celebrated with me when things have gone my way.

“That said I have bigger aspirations in 2025 that cross both what I am trying to change in BTCC and how a team engages with those changes, especially in terms of greater social media coverage and the championship being seen as the future of where motorsport can go with fan engagement.

“And my work with Crazy Carts I hope is going to be even bigger and that doesn’t fit with some of the brands that support EXCELR8.”