Nicolas Hamilton has broken a season-and-a-half sabbatical to return to the British Touring Car Championship for 2025.
The 32-year-old younger brother of seven-time Formula 1 world champion Lewis Hamilton will race for Un-Limited Motorsport in a Cupra Leon as the team expands to a third car for the season.
That was unexpected, because the team was listed with just two TOCA TBL entry licences for 2025, but now Hamilton will join fellow BTCC returnee Dexter Patterson and hotly tipped 2024 Mini Challenge runner-up Max Hall.
Hamilton will therefore be driving the same model of car he raced from 2021 to mid-2023 for Team Hard, which collapsed at the end of the latter season.
“To be brutally honest, I wasn’t planning to race this year,” Hamilton told Autosport.
“We didn’t even know that I’d ever get back on the BTCC grid, but Bob [Sharpless, Un-Limited team principal] and his team got in touch at the end of December, which is very late to be able to go and get sponsors and everything that you need.
“He gave me a real good deal that I thought would be possible to get in terms of the funding, and I said to him, ‘Yeah, why not? I’ll give it a go.’
“I get all my finding and budget myself, so it was just one of those situations of ‘let’s see how I get on over the next couple of weeks, and if I get the budget together then I’d love to join.’
“Fortunately through blood, sweat, tears and some late nights, and thanks to my partners that believe in me, I got the budget together and I’m back on the grid!”
Hamilton, whose best result to date in the BTCC is a sixth place at Donington Park early in 2023, has cerebral palsy and is aiming to encourage other disabled people into motorsport. As part of this, he is working with Sevenoaks-based charity We Are Beams, which helps disabled children and young people.
“I want to make the world realise that motorsport is inclusive, that disabled people should be proud, and that motorsport can accept them,” he said. “You don’t necessarily have to be a racing driver to be a part of the industry.
“A lot of people just take pictures next to their car and say that they’re back racing. This year I really wanted to use my platform to help inspire the industry to bring more disabled people into the sport.”
Un-Limited was a new team for 2024, during which it ran a single Cupra for Daryl DeLeon, so Hamilton’s arrival represents a tripling in its size.
“He [Hamilton] is hugely determined to get back on the BTCC grid, and I’m proud that we could make it happen,” said Sharpless.
“Nic is not just an incredibly well-known driver – he’s an inspiration worldwide. The fact that he’s put his trust in our team speaks volumes about how far we’ve come in such a short time.
“We’re excited to support him on this journey and can’t wait to see what we achieve together.”
Hamilton, who has not driven a racing car since he split with Team Hard in July 2023, will be back on track for the first time in a private test at Brands Hatch on Friday – his 33rd birthday – before taking part in the official BTCC tests at Croft next week and then Donington.
That leaves just one seat to be assigned for the start of the 2025 BTCC season.
While it is understood that the Power Maxed Racing Vauxhall team could still add a second driver to join Mikey Doble, that will only come later in the campaign.
Excelr8 Motorsport’s Mini Challenge triple champion Dan Zelos, who made such a strong impression on his step up to the BTCC in the last three rounds of 2024, has ruled himself out of that team’s final Hyundai i30 N seat. He will instead switch to rear-wheel-drive machinery in the Porsche Sprint Challenge GB.
Autosport sources suggest that two drivers will fill the Excelr8 vacancy, one of them for the first half of the season and the other for the second.
