Paul Jeffrey
Premium
The TCR Series and the UK's Motor Sport Association have today confirmed a new TCR UK Series, beginning in 2018.
In something of a brave move considering the popularity of the well established British Touring Car Championship, TCR Chief Executive Marcello Lotti has confirmed a British version of the increasingly popular TCR series will launch in the UK as early as 2018.
With TCR offering a low cost and highly competitive touring car platform, many national series have adopted the relatively new rule set with great success over the past couple of years. The main TCR International Series continues to attract ever increasing numbers of cars and International drivers, and with such regional series as TCR Germany, TCR Italy and TCR Thailand amongst others continuing to grow in popularity and competitiveness, it has long been a target of the series promoters to bring the TCR regulation cars to the United Kingdom.
Marcello Lotti, TCR Chief Executive and former WTCC Promoter commented: “I am delighted that a TCR UK championship becomes the latest addition to our already large family of TCR series worldwide. This is a particularly important achievement, because the UK remains the reference country for motorsport due to its concentration of engineering companies, teams and professional people. We are confident that the new series will be successful thanks to the long-standing British tradition for motorsport in general, with particular enthusiasm for the various Touring Car categories.”
Having secured outline approval for a UK based TCR series in 2018 from the MSA’s Championship Control Panel, the new UK string of the TCR series will be headed up by Jonathan Ashman, who amongst other achievements was one of the instrumental members of the group who devised and then ran the incredible Super Touring regulations of the early 1990's. In recent years, Ashman has been an FIA steward and held the position of head of the head of the FIA Touring Car Commission.
“I have worked with Marcello Lotti since the TCR concept was launched, especially with regard to the arrangements with Formula One Management" Added Ashman. This new adventure with TCR UK brings me back to my previous experience as a Touring Car promoter, which gives me plenty of motivation to repeat the earlier success. I’m also especially pleased to have an experienced and professional management team alongside me.”
The new series will be organised by the BRSCC (British Racing and Sports Car Club) and is expected to run for up to seven events comprising of two races per weekend in its debut season, with neither teams, drivers or circuits confirmed at this early stage.
Although touring car racing is synonymous with short, sharp racing events the TCR regulation cars are not unknown to run in longer semi endurance or endurance formats, and this could be a possibility for the British championship as it looks to make itself unique in the face of stiff competition from the well established and currently booming British Touring Car Championship.
Is the UK big enough for two top level touring car series, or can only one of the championships come out on top in the long run? Only time will tell....
Check out our Motorsport Sub Forum here at RaceDepartment to discuss this exciting new series, or indeed any two, three or four wheeled real life motorsport! Motorsport is awesome, so get involved in the chat and tell us how much you love the thrill of the race!
Happy to hear of another new UK touring car series, or do you think the competition between this and the BTCC is a bad thing for the sport in the UK? Let us know in the comments section below!
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