TCR / 29 September 2025
Civic Type R TCR FL5 wins on Nordschleife debut
The Honda Civic Type R TCR FL5 scored a milestone debut victory on the fearsome Nurburgring Nordschleife while ALM Motorsport magnificently won races in different countries on the same weekend.
A record-breaking success for driver Mike Halder in one of them continued to cement the reputation of the JAS Motorsport-built racer as one of the outstanding touring cars of the generation.
NLS
Formula One podium finisher Tiago Monteiro and Mike Halder had the honour of giving the FL5 Civic its Nordschleife debut in what was the first step of a programme aimed at participating in next year's Nurburgring 24 Hours.
Billed as nothing more than a 'test' in racing conditions, Monteiro, Halder and the ALM Motorsport team - which received technical support from JAS Motorsport for the event - won the TCR class by more than 30 seconds in the four-hour race.
Halder, who broke the lap record in the process, claimed another piece of history as he became the first driver to win 12 races in a calendar year aboard the Civic Type R TCR.
TCR Europe
Twenty-four hours earlier ALM had scored a dominant pole position and race victory in the opening race of the season finale at Barcelona, Spain, thanks to young Estonian Ruben Volt.
Volt's second success of the year was also his second win in the Youth Trophy while team-mate Rene Kircher was eighth and sixth in the two races.
Felipe Fernandez drove through the field from 10th at the end of the opening lap of Race Two to finish fifth for Auto Club RC2 Valles while MM Motorsport's Marco Butti, who led the points coming into the weekend, incurred track-limit penalties in both races and scored a best result of 14th.
His team-mate Giacomo Ghermandi dominated the Diamond Trophy class as he won both races while Jacopo Cimenes' sister car was ruled out of the weekend after he stalled at the start of Race One and was collected by Victor Fernandez.
While Fernandez's RC2 car also took no further part in the weekend, ALM debutant Gary Kwok finished fourth in class on both days.
Italian GT Championship
Nova Race scored an excellent second-place finish at Imola at the penultimate round of the series' Sprint Championship thanks to Felice Jelmini and Daniele di Amato.
Jelmini qualified third in the Pro category and he ran at the front throughout the first stint of Saturday's opening race, but a 12-second pitstop handicap, carried over because of a runner-up finish at the previous round, threatened to ruin their day.
Di Amato drove superbly to recover positions and time and finished less than 1s from victory. They were seventh overall – and fourth in the Pro class – on Sunday and retain a chance of the title with one round to go.
A qualifying crash for Paolo Rocca put the sister car – which he was due to share with Luca Magnoni – out of commission for the weekend’s races.
TCR Eastern Europe
Bojan Miljkovic scored a podium double in TCR Croatia as the series joined up with TCR Eastern Europe for the second time this year at Balaton Park, Hungary.
Metago Racing Team driver Miljkovic, piloting an FK2 model Civic Type R TCR, qualified third best of the Croatia competitors and finished there in both races. His results put him eighth and seventh.
