Photo: TCR Europe

TCR Europe ends summer break but stays in Germany with Nürburgring trip

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TCR Europe heads to the Nürburgring this weekend to complete a summer of races in Germany, and after a break of nearly two months for the teams.

Last time out at the start of July the series was at the Norisring for its first ever street races, and it was home hero Mike Halder in his Honda Civic Type R TCR and championship leader Franco Girolami in one of Comtoyou Racing’s Audi RS 3 LMS cars who claimed the victories.

Girolami leads by 72 points after eight races, and there are six races of the season still to go meaning the title race is still totally open.

Volcano Motorsport could be a team to watch this weekend with its trio of Cupra Leon Competicións for Klim Gavrilov, Evgeny Leonov and Isidro Callejas, as the Spanish team won both races last year at the Nürburgring when the circuit made its first appearance in the series.

There will be 20 cars in total out on track this weekend, as the two-car RC2 Junior Team outfit will not be present but Comtoyou’s Tom Coronel returns after missing the last round as he had to prioritise a clashing World Touring Car Cup commitment, RaceSing’s Patrick Sing stays on in a Hyundai i20 N after enjoying his Norisring debut and his ADAC TCR Germany rival Jonas Karklys joins in an identical run by Lithuania’s NordPass-branded Juta Racing team.

Karklys won the 2021 TCR Germany finale at the Nürburgring, and so far has claimed two pole positions this season but is yet to take another win.

Fugel Motorsport’s Marcel Fugel, who came seventh in TCR Germany last year and was the series’ Junior classification champion the year before, has been announced as competing this weekend in the same Civic Type R he drove domestically last year but his name has not appeared on TCR Europe’s entry list for the event and TouringCarTimes understands he is not anticipated to race.

The first track action at the Nürburgring will be on Friday, with the two half-hour practice sessions starting at 11:25 and 16:40 local time (CET). Qualifying begins at 08:55 on Saturday, and could take place on a damp track with rain expected overnight, then the first race of the weekend begins at 17:00. There is then a whole day before the TCR Europe field lines up on the grid again for race two, which is at 17:50 on Sunday.