Stefano Comini wins the final round of the 2017 season at Dubai
Stefano Comini won an incident-packed final round of the 2017 TCR International Series season for Comtoyou Racing, taking the lead after early race leader Attila Tassi was hit with a drive-through penalty for a jump start.
The first laps were contact-heavy, while Tassi crawled before the lights went out and led the way into Turn 1, Comini slotted in second while Gianni Morbidelli moved up to third in the WestCoast Racing Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR.
Into the first turn, the two British drivers Josh Files in the M1RA Honda and James Nash in the Craft-Bamboo SEAT made side-by-side contact into the first corner, with Nash coming off worse and dropping down the order.
Later on the first lap, Gabriele Tarquini’s Hyundai was spun out by Pepe Oriola’s SEAT. Oriola retired with damage, while Tarquini fell to the back of the pack, but was able to continue.
It wasn’t until lap eight that a drive-through penalty was confirmed for Tassi, which was set to have a significant impact on the championship, with Comini needing to win with Tassi not scoring to take second from the Hungarian.
With Roberto Colciago’s car too damaged to start the race, Honda were now on the back foot in the model of the year battle against Volkswagen, with Morbidelli set to score strongly as he was running in second position.
Tassi’s drive-through also promoted Dupont to third, but the Belgian was having to defend heavily against Josh Files in the M1RA Honda.
Files made his move at the final turn on lap 12 and grabbed the final podium position, with Dupont soon assaulted by a number of cars behind, being passed soon by both Frédéric Vervisch’s Audi and Jean-Karl Vernay’s Volkswagen.
Vernay stopped with two laps to go, which meant disaster for Team WRT, as their challenge for second in the teams’ championship effectively came to an end.
Crucially, Tassi was able to work his way up to 12th, which with the two Hyundais invisible to points, meant he picked up a single point and maintained his second position in the drivers’ championship.
Comini took the chequered flag to take his third win of the season, his first since Salzburgring back in June, finishing the season with victory, 1.1 seconds ahead of Morbidelli, with Files five seconds back in third.
The strong result for Volkswagen saw them jump ahead of Honda in the model of the year standings by five points.
The race was the last for the TCR International Series this season, with next year’s calendar unclear with speculation that the series could merge with the World Touring Car Championship for 2018.
