Cheah beats Moran, as Engstler retires from the lead

Mitchell Cheah preceded his teammate Diego Moran by only one tenth of a second under the chequered flag in a thrilling final of the TCR Asia and TCR Thailand Race 1 at Buriram’s Chang International Circuit.
The two Liqui Moly Team Engstler drivers had had a close fight for the second position over 13 of the race’s 15 laps, while they were running six seconds behind their teammate Luca Engstler who had pulled away from the start. However, with two laps to go the young German’s Volkswagen Golf GTI suddenly slowed down and retired because of a puncture, leaving Cheah and Moran to fight for victory in the sister cars.
Pattarapol Vongprai completed the podium and won the TCR Thailand race in the Vattana Motorsport Honda Civic after making a good progression that saw him passing Alex Liu in the Elegant Racing Team SEAT León on lap 10. Later on Liu dropped to sixth, as he was passed by the Honda Civic cars of Lo Sze Ho (Maximum Racing) on lap 13 and Chariya Nuya (Billionaire Boy Racing) on lap 14.
Lo Sze Ho claimed third in TCR Asia, while Nuya and Jakraphan Davee (Alfaphactory Racing SEAT) ranked second and third in TCR Thailand.
Today’s victory meant that Cheah stretched his leadership in the TCR Asia classification to 25 points ahead of Engstler, while Moran lies a further four points adrift.
Vongprai leads the TCR Thailand standings with 65 points, followed by Nuya (54) and Davee (52).
The second race will start at tomorrow at 15:05 local time (10:05am CET).