3. Vauxhall Astra Coupe
Picture source – BTCC Crazy
The tour de force of the British Touring Car Championship world in the early 2000s was unquestionably the Vauxhall Astra, though the marque still pulled a good points haul with the succeeding (and preceding) Vectra. The Astra Coupe – with Vauxhall Motorsport/VX Racing – took four championships on the bounce and provided a mouth-watering championship spectacle with in-house title duels. At the forefront of each was ’03 champion Yvan Muller, who would take on British titans Jason Plato (’01 champion) and James Thompson (’02 and ’04 champion) before the Astra Sport Hatch arrived for 2005, leaving Team Halford’s Honda Integra Type-R to take the reigns.
