Photo: TCR Germany

Last lap overtake gives Mike Halder victory in restarted second race

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Mike Halder bounced back from his Race 1 retirement to take victory on the final lap of a restarted second race of the TCR Germany season opener weekend at Oschersleben.

The Team Honda ADAC Sachsen driver made a series of well executed overtakes throughout the race and made a crucial dive up the inside of race leader Petr Fulín, as the Czech racer ran wide at Turn 7.

Fulín finished second in his Cupra TCR, just half a second behind Halder, while Dutchman Niels Langeveld completed the podium in third.

The race was restarted and reduced to just 15 minutes in length after a multi-car incident brought out the red flags on the opening lap.

Simon Reicher lost control of his Audi RS 3 LMS coming through the Triple curve and eventually spun in front of the field.

The incident took out a number of cars including Marcel Fugel, Kai Jordan, Théo Coicaud, Benjamin Leuchter and Race 1 winner Harald Proczyk.

Coicaud, Leuchter and Proczyk were all able to to score points in the restarted race, but Fugel and Jordan suffered too much damage to continue.

LMS Racing’s Antti Buri had taken the lead at the initial start but was adjudged to have jumped the initial start and the Finn received a drive-through penalty.

That gave Fulín the lead with just ten minutes remaining, while Halder began to make progress through the pack by overtaking the Team Engstler Europe Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR of Luca Engstler for fourth.

Halder then made an audacious move up the inside of Langeveld at the final corner to take second. The pair made slight contact which forced Langeveld wide, a move the stewards deemed a racing incident.

Halder hauled his Honda Civic TCR to within nine-tenths of a second of Fulín’s Cupra entering the final minute and made a decisive pass on Fulin at turn three as the Czech driver ran too deep under braking.

The German duly took the flag ahead of Fulin and Langeveld, with Engstler just missing out on the podium in fourth.

Behind the leading quartet, Swiss driver Florian Thoma was fifth ahead of Race 1 victor Proczyk.

After being excluded from qualifying, Benjamin Leuchter brought his Max Kreuse Racing Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR home in seventh, with Coicaud, Wankmüller and Lukas Niedertscheider (Peugeot 308TCR) completing the top ten.