Kantadhee Kusiri completes dominant weekend with Race 2 win in Shanghai

Kantadhee Kusiri won the second race of the weekend, meaning he topped every session in Shanghai this weekend. The Team Engstler driver led home team-mate Diego Moran by a good margin, with stable-mate Sunny Wong completing the podium in the Teamwork Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR, the driver from Hong Kong also winning the TCR China class.

Kusiri’s good start meant he stayed in the lead going into the first corner and never looked back. Team-mate Moran had a bad start and dropped to fourth from second on the grid, but the Ecuadorian managed to get back into second place within four corners, nobody able to challenge him thereafter.

The entertainment was provided by the TCR China drivers, as Andy Yan led a train of four cars all fighting for the outright podium, as well as the class win. The Teamwork Volkswagens of Filipe de Souza and Sunny Wong attacked him for the place, joined by Yan’s NewFaster team-mate Huang Chu Han in his Audi RS 3 LMS.

A fun battle included perhaps a bit too much of contact, the battle eventually resolving in De Souza spinning into the wall after making a mistake at the last corner on lap 7. Wong was able to make a considerable gap and disappear into the distance in third, whereas Ma Qing Hua continued a hard battle for an outright fourth with Yan, with the former World Touring Car Championship driver winning the fight and taking second in class.

Tin Sritrai recovered from a difficult start of the race to complete the TCR Asia podium in his Honda Civic TCR, the Thai coming sixth outright ahead of Teamwork’s Wang Hao.

Former TCR Asia points leader Lai Wee Sing was eighth at the flag and fourth in TCR Asia, finishing ahead of Eric Kwong and Abdul Kaathir, who completed the top ten.

Kusiri now leads the standings by 10.5 points over Sritrai in TCR Asia.