Southend racing driver Bill Stilwell is not competing in the MGF Cup this year - but his fans will still be able to see him in action.

For the 36-year-old has agreed to race for Honda this summer in 24-hour events at Belgium's Spa-Francorchamps and Germany's Nurburgring circuits.

But Bill, the sales manager at Southend-based Belle Vue Motors, has not ruled out a return to the popular MGF Cup series.

"I have commited to Honda to do 24-hour racing and testing," confirmed Bill, who was awarded the Dunlop Spirit of the Championship award after competing in 12 of the 14 MGF Cup rounds last year.

"It will be a good experience for me and I'm looking forward to it. The car is a heavily-modified Honda Civic 1.8 VTEC which has been built for endurance racing.

"My role testing will be to improve performance of the car in endurance trim, but not at the cost of reliability."

With 24-hour testing not possible, Bill will do most of the leg work in the UK before fine-tuning the car in the days leading up to the race at the circuit. The exact dates have yet to be set for the races, although they will be in June and July.

It is not the first time Bill has raced with Honda UK. He raced in the Saloon 2000 Championship for the Swindon-based team when they won the series in 1995.

More races in Britain and the Continent followed and in 1997 the team won the European title.

The following year Honda pulled out of racing and Bill switched to the MGF Cup, contesting the series in Romford-based Premier Motors' car.

Bill explained the Rover car dealership had spent a lot of money developing new sites in the latter part of 1999 and was looking for partners to keep the car on the track this year.

That left Bill looking for a drive, but MG invited Bill to their Cup awards dinner last month where he met several other dealers who were interested in signing him up.

"There was one chap who I spoke to and I am waiting to see if he can come up with a deal," said Bill. "If I do not get a deal by the beginning of March then the MGF Cup will be a non-starter for me this year.

"The car is there waiting to go, so we'll just have to wait and see."

Fast mover - Southend driver Bill Stilwell (left) has been forced to ditch the MGF series car he is seen driving here. But he moved quickly to secure a new deal and will drive for Honda in 24-hour races during the upcoming season

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.