Photo: TCR Europe

Julien Briché leads Peugeot 1-2 in Hockenheim Race 2

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Julian Briché has won his second race of the 2019 TCR Europe series season, and has moved up to second in the standings behind points leader Josh Files, with the Frenchman leading an all Peugeot top two ahead of Aurélien Comte, with Jessica Bäckman securing her first podium in the series.

The Frenchman started from pole position and led into Turn 1 ahead of Jessica Bäckman’s Target Competition Hyundai, while Aurélien Comte was immediately up to third in his DG Sport Peugeot 308TCR, and soon passed Bäckman’s car at the hairpin.

Further back, Stian Paulsen ran wide in his Cupra TCR, and rejoined the track ahead of Dusan Borkovic’s Hyundai, with the Serbian neatly nudging the Norwegian into a spin and into the gravel trap, causing a safety car period.

After the restart on lap four, yesterday’s race winner Josh Files was trying his hardest to get ahead of the rival Hyundai of Luca Engstler, briefly nosing ahead, but the his former TCR Germany rival knew where to place his car to get back ahead at the next turn.

The two drivers battle allowed WRT Audi driver Santiago Urrutia to get past the two of them for sixth.

Files and Engstler continued to fight, but when Comtoyou Racing’s Gilles Magnus also managed to pass Files, when Files was able to get back ahead of the Belgian, the fight died down with Files setting for eighth.

Urrutia continued his recovered from his second bad start of the weekend, after starting third on the grid, and soon passed WRT team-mate Maxime Potty for fifth, where he’d finish the race.

Briché won the race by 1.3 seconds over Comte, with Jessica Bäckman third ahead of her brother Andreas, with Urrutia fifth.

Maxime Potty was the best of the Volkswagens in sixth ahead of the two Hyundais of Luca Engstler and Josh Files, with Gilles Magnus ninth in his Audi, and Tom Coronel securing a top ten for Boutsen Ginion Honda from 21st on the grid.

Files still leads the championship, now on 112 points, five clear of the next round of the series at Spa-Francorchamps in two weeks’ time.