Built by Gareth Howell and intended to run in the 1999 British Touring Car Championship under the Atford Racing banner. Although allocated an entry number (18) the car would never get to race.

The car appeared at official BTCC tests at Donington Park and Silverstone but proved to be off the pace, setting a time that would have been outside the normal qualifying maximum. Plans to run the car at the Oulton Park meeting the following weekend were cancelled and eventually the whole project was abandoned.

The car was striped, the engine and gearbox sold off, and bare shell abandoned in a barn where it remained until 2014, when it was re-painted in blue and partly re-assembled. In May 2020 the car was sold to German team Varona Racing.