STCC retract decision to merge TCR and Clio Cup following criticism

The Scandinavian Touring Car Championship has retracted their decision, announced yesterday, to merge the TCR and Clio Cup (JTCC) classes for the 2017 season following massive criticism.

“We have received some criticism following the news that we released yesterday and we have because of that chosen to back off,” said Jonas Lundin, MD of STCC AB.

Several Swedish racing drivers voiced their discontent online on the decision yesterday:

“I wasn’t that happy when I was on the road to Gothenburg for a sponsor meeting and was about to praise the new TCR regulations and got to see this ”wonderful” news. I still can’t see how you can get a text so damn wrong,” wrote former STCC driver Jocke Mangs, who is working on an entry for next year, at rbcracing.se.

“I thought news like this would have appeared in February/March if they felt the need to fill out with more cars in the STCC. From a driver’s perspective, both qualifying and race will be really messy on track,” said five-time STCC champion Richard Göransson.

The decision to join the grids was interpreted by many as a sign of the organisation not having faith in the new TCR regulations.

“It is not about that. We are really comfortable with the development of STCC where from 2017 will introduce new regulations, TCR. The interest for the new STCC is great among teams and drivers both at home and in our Nordic neighbours,” said Lundin.

“What we in fact wanted with the decision, that was anchored with the international TCR management, was to secure JTCC, a class with great interest for STCC TCR Scandinavia. JTCC will be an important class of the STCC weekend in the coming seasons, but we have also seen a risk in that 2017 could be somewhat of a start-up year. That is why we wanted to join JTCC with STCC on the circuits where we find it suitable regarding field size, but because of the criticism we are withdrawing the decision and will work on other ways to get a strong development of the class.”