TCR World and life

14 AUSTRALIA WillBrowniscrowned thefirstchampion GUESTWTCR STAR NÉSTOR GIROLAMI DOMINATES AT SANDOWN Will Brown has been crowned the first champion of TCR Australia with another race weekend remaining to conclude the inaugural season. Despite the fact that it was guest driver Néstor Girolami who took all three race victories at the series’ penultimate weekend at Sandown, Brown did enough to secure the Drivers’ title. WINTON – A PROFITABLE WEEKEND FOR BROWN After going quickest in practice, Brown took pole position for the weekend’s first race, although it was the Volkswagen Golf GTI of Jason Bright that took the win after early contact between Brown’s Hyundai i30 N and the Honda Civic of John Martin left Brown to finish as runner-up to Bright and Martin to trail home in 15th place. The situation was reversed in Race 2, when Brown passed Bright for the lead early in the race and then cruised to a comfortable win of nearly eight seconds. Race 3 then saw Brown claim his second win of the day when he beat the VW of Aaron Cameron by over ten seconds, with third-placed Russell Ingall’s Audi RS3 LMS making it three different brands on the podium. Following the race weekend, a well- attended test day on the Monday saw a total of 22 drivers given the opportunity to sample TCR cars for the first time. These included a number of drivers who are considering entries in the new TCR New Zealand series that gets underway in January.