Australian drivers discover TCR at Sidney Motorsport Park

TCR Australia was officially launched in a media and competitors day at Sydney Motorsport Park, where an array of drivers and teams attended to get a close look at the category.
Four cars were available for testing: Audi RS3 LMS, Hyundai i30 N, Honda Civic Type R and Volkswagen Golf GTI. Drivers who sampled them included 2014 Bathurst 1000 champion Chaz Mostert, James Moffat, Leanne Tander, Tony D’Alberto and Macauley Jones, among others. Leading Australian race team identities, like Garry Rogers, Brad Jones and Jason Bright, as well as other high-profile guests were onsite. 
Mostert got his maiden TCR laps in the HMO Customer Racing Hyundai, while Moffat drove the Honda, Tander and Jones steered the Audi and D’Alberto undertook laps inside the Volkswagen.

Chaz Mostert: “I haven’t driven too many front wheel drive cars, but it felt pretty cool. They are kind of like a hot hatch, front wheel drive GT3 car. It handles really good, you can get quite a lot of speed up and the way it moves around is quite exciting. They are actually quite comparable to a GT3 car in terms of driver satisfaction. TCR is pretty cool and it will be great to see a big field of these racing toe to toe, there’s a lot of potential in the series.”

James Moffat: “TCR is an exciting, world wide category. It was exciting to be involved in the launch and driving the Honda was a lot of fun. TCR is appealing to manufacturers. You can see that with how many brands are involved in the different championships around the world. It will be interesting to see how many different types of cars end up here.”

Leanne Tander: “I loved driving the Audi. It was amazing and so much fun. There’s so much power when you put your foot down and it just goes. I’d love to race one with 15 or 20 cars around. I think the racing would be great and I hope that I can be involved.”

Macauley Jones: “It’s funny how things go around. I grew up watching videos of dad racing Audi cars. It was very exciting to drive the Audi. My first impression was that I surprised. They are really nice cars to drive. The power delivery was a lot different to Supercars, but the turn in the car was really cool. It was fun to drive.”

Many other drivers also got opportunities to drive, including recently crowned Australian F4 Champion Jayden Ojeda, rising star Charlotte Poynting and former track and field athlete turned racer John Steffensen.
TCR Australia used the media and competitor day to announce several key sporting regulations, including Michelin as the official tyre supplier and provisional race formats based on three races per event.