Euro round-up: champ gets ready to reverse…

The 34-year-old from Sassuolo near Maranello aims to win his fifth Super Touring crown in five years. He will again race a Nordauto-prepared Alfa Romeo 156 as he attempts to add another title to his Spanish (1997), Italian (1998 and '99) and Euro STC (2000) successes. The finishing order from the first race at each ETCC round will be reversed to give the grid order for the second 70km race.

"I love the idea of the reverse grid for the second race," said Giovanardi. "I like to fight and recover very much, so I know I will drive 120 per cent every time. To race in the new FIA championship will be a great boost for my motivation this year."

A former F3 and F3000 race winner, Giovanardi switched to Touring Cars in 1993 and has since won a total of 54 races for Peugeot and Alfa.

Kigema Sports Organisation has been appointed by the FIA World Motor Sport Council to organise this year's ETCC. Mauro Sipsz will act as Chairman and Marcello Lotti is the new General Manager of the series.

Fulltime participants in the ETCC will be eligible for prize money, which will be divided between the main Super Touring Championship and the Super Production Championship. KSO will split the drivers taking part in the FIA Super Touring Championship into two categories, 'Pro' for professional drivers and 'Am' for non-professional drivers. This will be decided on their racing CVs, the technical specifications of their machinery and the experience of their teams.

Among the 40 teams to have expressed an interest in the ETCC for 2001 are AGS Motorsport, Barwell Motorsport, CiBiEmme Engineering, DAMS, Edenbridge Racing, Eje Elgh Motorsport, European Luigi Racing, GR Motorsport, JAS Motorsport, Nordauto Engineering, Picko Troberg Motorsport, Scuderia Bigazzi, Solution F and Wolf Racing.

Former racer Roberto Ravaglia, the last FIA European Touring Car champion in 1988, has set-up his own team for this year's resurrected series. Inextricably linked with BMW, the Italian won the only World Touring Car crown in 1987, but retired from racing at the end of 1997. He will field a pair of 320i E46s in the Super Production class: "For me it's a completely new challenge. And I begin to understand now that managing a team is much more difficult than driving a car. But even as a team owner, I still have the same ambitions I had as a driver, I still want to win."