TCR Europe heads to Budapest with Mikel Azcona as the hunted one
TCR Europe rolls on to the Hungaroring near Budapest this weekend, with Spaniard Mikel Azcona leading the standings after another strong points haul at Spa-Francorchamps.
The PCR Sport Cupra driver picked up a third and fourth place in Belgium to move 11 points clear of Target Competition driver Dusan Borkovic at the top of the table. Borkovic, who claimed a pair of wins at the opening round of the year at Paul Ricard, was tied on points with Azcona heading into Spa, but a lowly seventh in race two means the Serbian has work to do.
Having missed Zandvoort in order to focus on his WTCR commitments, Frenchman Jean-Karl Vernay claimed his first win of the season at Spa in his Team WRT Audi RS 3 LMS. Remarkably, despite a total of four non-scores this season so far, the reigning TCR International champion is just 39 points off Azcona in the standings.
Another Frenchman to enjoy a successful weekend in Belgium was Peugeot and JSB Compétition driver Julien Briché, who secured his maiden win in the second race of the weekend. Briché missed the opening round at Le Castellet and left Zandvoort pointless, but surprised many by taking a win and a fifth in his Peugeot 308TCR, the marque’s first win in the series.
After a difficult start to the year, Belgian Maxime Potty finally found some luck to claim his first and second podiums respectively at Spa last month. The 19-year-old Comtoyou Racing driver finished just seven-tenths of a second behind Vernay in the first race before claiming a third place finish in race two.
The weekend was not without its incidents, particularly in the second race. Briché’s path to victory was not as simple as it looked on the results sheet, as contact down the Kemmel Straight with Potty’s Volkswagen Golf GTI nearly put both drivers off the circuit. Having survived that, the Peugeot driver was then harpooned by Vernay’s Audi following the safety car restart in the closing stages.
And having followed on-the-road victor Kris Richard of Target Competition, Briché inherited the win after the Hyundai driver was penalised for contact with the Frenchman.
The compensation weight for this weekend gives the Audi RS 3 LMS an extra 20k to 60kg, while the Cupras and Honda Type R FK8s have lost 40kg to 20kg and 0kg respectively. The Hyundai i30 N has lost 50kg to 0kg while the Peugeot 308TCR and Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR remain on 0kg.
Autodis Racing’s Cedric Piro and Loris Cencetti will also swap cars for the trip to Budapest, with Piro moving from his Honda Civic Type R FK8 to Cencetti’s Hyundai i30 N TCR.
The weekend will start on Friday with free practice, with the first session scheduled for 12:00 CEST and the second for 16:00, both lasting 30 minutes. Qualifying will be held on Saturday at 09:55, with the usual Q1-Q2 format.
Race one takes place on Saturday afternoon, starting at 13:40 and lasting 25 minutes. The second race will start at 11:50 on Sunday.
TCR Europe – Hungaroring timetable
Friday 6th July
12:00 – Free practice 1
16:00 – Free practice 2
Saturday 7th July
09:55 – Qualifying
13:40 – Race 1
Sunday 8th July
11:50 – Race 2
