Josh Buchan closes in on points lead after Race 1 win at Sydney Motorsport Park

Josh Buchan has closed in on points leader Zac Soutar after winning the first TCR Australia race of the weekend at Sydney Motorsport Park.

The Hyundai driver headed the field from lights to flag while Brad Harris had to defend second place from Wall Racing Honda team-mate Tony D’Alberto.

But D’Alberto could not keep Lynk & Co driver Dylan O’Keeffe who snatched third place on the third lap.

One lap later saw Hyundai driver Tom Oliphant repeating the move to claim fourth place.

There was further engine-related drama for the Garry Rogers Motorsport team with the older Peugeot 308TCRs, as Aaron Cameron failed to make it to the grid, reducing the field to eleven cars.

His team-mate Ryan Casha also suffered engine issues later during the race, dropping him down the order to finish eleventh and last.

Buchan won the race by two seconds over Harris while O’Keeffe was three seconds behind in third.

Oliphant took his Hyundai i30 N TCR to fourth ahead of D’Alberto, while points leader Soutar (Audi) could only manage sixth, now heading Buchan by just nine points in the drivers’ standings.

Will Harris came home in seventh while the GRM duo of Jordan Cox and Ben Bargwanna took the new Peugeot P51 308 TCR to eighth and ninth in its race debut.

The second race of the weekend starts at 11:55 local time/02:55 CEST on Sunday.