Reigning Overall TCE Teams’ champion Autorama Motorsport by Wolf-Power Racing has made history this afternoon at the 16H HOCKENHEIMRING by becoming the first TCR entrant to secure a spot on the outright podium at a 24H SERIES GT/TCE event.
Although TCR teams have secured overall podiums at TCE-only races in the past, this weekend marks the first time that a TCR competitor has finished on the podium of a 24H SERIES event that features both the GT and TCE divisions.
The Autorama Motorsport by Wolf-Power Racing Volkswagen Golf GTi TCR (#1, Constantin Kletzer / Jasmin Preisig / Christoph Lenz / Rhys Lloyd / Yannick Mettler) was aided by incidents for the GT3 frontrunners, and also had to weather an incredibly close battle between the top three runners in TCE in the closing stages.
In the end, Rhys Lloyd collected the chequered flag for Autorama Motorsport by Wolf-Power Racing, the #1 Volkswagen having completing 450 laps of the 4.574km Hockenheimring en-route to the team’s second class win of the season.
Victory had looked set to go to the sister Autorama Volkswagen (#112, Alberto Vescovi / Roberto Ferri / Miklas Born / Marek Schaller / Benjamin Leuchter), but a bizarre incident in which the onboard fire extinguisher discharged in the cabin cost the team several laps to rectify. Having secured its fourth consecutive TCR podium of the year though, the #112 maintains its advantage at the top of the Overall TCE Teams’ championship standings.
The TOPCAR Sport CUPRA TCR (#131, Fabian Danz / Karen Gaillard / Kai Jordan) rounded out the TCE podium, despite almost being eliminated on the very first lap of the race in a bizarre collision with AC Motorsport and Red Camel-Jordans.nl. So close was the battle for the podium, the CUPRA finished just 47s behind the top two after 16 hours of endurance racing.
Dakar Rally mainstay Tim Coronel took his second consecutive class win in the 24H SERIES aboard the Day V Tec BMW 240i (#240, Jan Jaap van Roon / Tim Coronel / Gaby Uljee), despite having trouble getting the BMW rolling on the warm-up lap.
Nordschleife Racing meanwhile (#226, Guillaume Roman / Daniel Waszczinski / Michel Sallenbach) had finished two laps ahead of its Dutch rival, but a start procedure infringement meant the Ligier JS2 R was penalised four laps after the race, and has thus been classified 2nd in TCX and 5th overall in the TCE division.
The Red Camel-Jordans.nl CUPRA TCR (#101, Ivo Breukers / Luc Breukers / Steven Liquorish) finished a hard-earned 6th in the TCE division. Having been indirectly involved with the opening lap accident on Friday, the CUPRA suffered further damage with an off-track moment in the wet later that afternoon, the effects of which were still being felt during an extended pit stop this afternoon.
Sadly, having survived its earlier accident, the AC Motorsport Audi RS3 LMS (#188, Stéphane Perrin / Vincent Radermecker / Mathieu Detry) was eventually retired with irreparable handling problems.
