Povlsen wins Race 2 while Halder pits and Jensen is champion
René Povlsen withstood pressure from Kasper Jensen to win the penultimate race of the 2024 TCR Denmark at Jyllandsringen while Mike Halder was forced to pit after another incident with his title rival, resulting in Jensen securing his fifth consecutive title.
Povlsen (Honda) started from the reversed grid pole position and headed the field into the first corner.
Mascot Motorsport’s Jensen (Honda) made a strong start and was up to fourth place before the end of the first lap from eighth on the grid, passing title rival Halder during the start.
Jensen made a late dive on rival Honda driver Philip Lindberg for third place on the second lap, with Halder following past soon after.
Jensen then got past Jacob Wunderov for second place a lap later, with Halder again following suit to get past a couple of corners later.
As Jensen and Halder closed in on leading driver Povlsen, Halder made a late move on Jensen heading into Turn 1, resulting in contact and a half-spin for the German driver.
The contact continued into Turn 2, with Jensen correcting a slide to keep second place while Halder slowed down with suspension damage.
The German dropped down to sixth place initially and later eleventh, meaning his title hopes fading away.
Swedish Honda driver Jonathan Engström went off into the gravel with three minutes left, with Lars Højris Nielsen going off in a separate incident two laps later.
Jensen was shadowing Povlsen closely in the final part of the race, but the TPR Motorsport driver withstood the pressure to claim victory ahead of Jensen.
Jensen’s team-mate Gustav Birch secured the final podium position ahead of Cupra driver Michael Markussen, Wunderow and Kim König.
Jensen’s victory means that he has secured his fifth consecutive TCR Denmark title as Halder drops to 35 points behind with 32 points remaining.
The third and final race of the weekend starts at 15:25 CEST.
