BTCC star Jason Plato wants to race at Le Mans in the future

The 47-year-old has raced in the BTCC for all-but-two seasons since making his debut in 1997, and he currently leads the championship.

He told AUTOSPORT he was still targeting an attack on the famous French enduro, but it would likely be after his time in the BTCC was over.

"There's still a big burning desire to do Le Mans but it has to be on my terms," he told AUTOSPORT.

"I have got to be in a good car and have two proper team-mates.

"Unless I'm I've got those ingredients I'm not interested.

"When the [BTCC's] racing is great and it has all these other great attributes it's very difficult to [leave], even though I'd love to race Le Mans or go and do V8 Supercars again.

"All the way through my career, all of my deals have been multi-year deals.

"I'd love to go other things but I don't think I can do Le Mans until I'm done with touring cars."

Plato, who has won 92 BTCC races, made a one-off appearance in the FIA Sportscar Championship in 2002.

That outing, where he finished fourth with Bob Berridge at Spa-Francorchamps, came in the middle of the ASCAR campaign that was intended to launch a future stock-car career in America.

"I wish that'd have kicked off," he said. "I didn't find ASCAR easy - if I'm honest was a little scary at times.

"That's predominantly because we didn't have the car working - I can imagine if I'd got involved in NASCAR like Marcos Ambrose did [from V8 Supercars], it could have been quite sensational.

"There's something very special about NASCAR and the racing.

"It's very easy to take the piss out of it but it's very tricky, very scientific - there's a lot of strategy.

"I would have loved to have had a go at that."