TCR / 10 June 2024
Five-star weekend for winning Civic Type R TCR
Five victories and three pole positions across three continents made for another hugely successful weekend for Honda Civic Type R TCR customer teams.
With Ruben Volt, Kasper H Jensen and Martin Xie all making the top step of the podium, the JAS Motorsport-built racing car continued to prove its merits as one of the best-performing cars in global motorsport in 2024.
TCR Italy
A week after his first TCR Europe win of the year, Ruben Volt claimed his maiden TCR Italy victory at Enna-Pergusa to move up to third place in the championship points.
The Estonian led the whole second race from pole position to add to the third place he had claimed in the morning race in Sicily. He was also second and first in the Under-25s category.
A masterful recovery from a first-corner off that dropped him to 16th resulted in Volt's ALM team-mate Paolo Rocca taking a career-best fifth place in Race Two, having retired with a puncture in the morning.
JAS Development Driver Levente Losonczy was 10th and eighth; the Hungarian climbing from 16th on the grid both times. MM Motorsport's Jacopo Cimenes and Edo Capello were second and sixth in the Rookie and Masters categories in Race 1.
TCR Denmark
Kasper H Jensen re-took the points lead from Mike Halder on a weekend of domination by the Mascot Motorsport with RaceGroup driver at Rudskogen, Norway.
The four-time champion took pole position and won all three races; though his Race Two victory only came after on-the-road winner Halder was penalised five seconds for exceeding track limits in his TPR Motorsport Civic.
That dropped Halder to third. He finished second in the other races while team-mate Rene Povlsen won the Trophy class three times to extend his series lead in the category.
RaceGroup's Malte Ebdrup and Gustav Birch shared the Under-25s wins with Ebdrup completing a Honda podium lockout in Race One. Jacob Wunderov (Wunderov Motorsport), Philip Lindberg (PL Racing) and Didrik Esbjug (Esbjug Motorsport) scored best results of sixth, sixth and eighth.
TCR China
Martin Xie was dominant at Shanghai on Saturday as the MacPro Racing Team driver scored his first win of the year. Having scored a second-straight pole position, he was unchallenged in the opener.
An early pitstop dropped him to the tail of the pack in Race Two but he recovered well to finish ninth. Team-mate Henry Ho scored his first podium of 2024 with third in Race Two, having qualified a season's-best ninth.
TRC's William Cheung was 11th in Race Two with Spark Racing's Yun Jie Zhou and Evolve Racing's Siu Ming Man taking best results of 12th. Norris Racing's Tony Chan was 13th twice while team-mate Chun Leung Chan was a double retiree.
TCR World Tour
Esteban Guerrieri scored his third podium finish of the year in a bruising second race at Mid-Ohio, USA.
The Argentinian was pushed back to 11th on the opening lap, but nursed his tyres carefully, made a series of strong passing moves and took advantage when several drivers ahead ran each other off the circuit.
He is now fourth in the Drivers' Championship while GOAT are third in the Teams' points.
JAS Development Driver Marco Butti led most of Race Two from pole position, but was a victim of ultra-aggressive driving from behind that resulted in more than one of his rivals being penalised post-race.
He finished 10th in Race Two, nursing a significantly-damaged car at the end. GOAT Team-mate Dusan Borkovic was 10th and seventh.
IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge
Karl Wittmer gave Montreal Motorsport Group a second-straight TCR pole position at Mid-Ohio, but some badly-timed safety cars ruined the hopes of the Civic he shared with Dai Yoshihara and the sister car of Bryan Ortiz and Louis-Philippe Montour.
Wittmer led the opening hour from fellow front-row starter Ortiz and both remained in podium contention until a safety car in the third hour.
Yoshihara was shuffled back at the pitstops during the caution period while Montour was unable to climb out at this optimal point as he had not completed his minimum drive time.
This led to an additional stop for the #6 car, which, added to a puncture, dropped he and Ortiz to seventh; two spots behind Wittmer and Yoshihara.
HART's Tyler Chambers, Steve Eich and Chad Gilsinger were in between them in sixth while Racers Edge Motorsports duo Daniel Wu and Tazio Ottis recovered from an early spin to finish 11th.
TCR Eastern Europe
Davit Kajaia scored his first podium finish of the season with a strong drive to second place at the Slovakiaring; the Georgian leading off the line and settling for the runner-up spot to add to his eighth place in Race One.
Mertel Motorsport Team-mate Rene Kircher was the highest Honda qualifier in fifth and was on course for third in Race One when a puncture dropped him to 11th. He was punted out of sixth on the last lap of Race Two.
Jorden Doschilka scored her first Junior class podium in Race Two with third in the category while an engine failure for Giacomo Ghermandi on the first lap of Saturday's race put him out of the rest of the weekend's action.
TCR Asia
Umar Abdullah scored a fifth-place finish in Race Two as the series headed back to Sepang, Malaysia, for its second event of 2024.
After qualifying fourth and climbing to third off the start his opening race was ruined when he was hit exiting the first corner, spun and retired later on the same lap with the resultant damage.
TCR UK
Bradley Thurston scored a top-10 finish on his first weekend racing a Honda Civic Type R TCR at Oulton Park.
The Go-Fix Honda with Sport77 driver did not set a time in qualifying, but drove to a ninth-place finish in Race Two; both he and team-mate Will Powell having to take to the grass on the first lap to avoid a spinning car in the middle of the track.
Powell was spun into Thurston on the opening lap of Race One by a rival; Thurston retiring and Powell continuing - after a pitstop for repairs - to finish 13th.
