Cupra wins the TCR class in the Nürburgring 24 Hours

In a typical Eifel region weekend that alternated between sunshine, rain and fog, the CUPRA run by LMS Racing and Bas Koeten Racing claimed a triumphant victory in the TCR class of the ADAC 24-Hour Nürburgring.
It was a hard-fought race. In the first five hours the two Hyundai i30 N cars and the Team Prosport-Performance Audi RS3 LMS alternated in the lead. When the two Korean cars suffered from minor technical issues, the Audi driven by Christoph Breuer, Jürgen Nett, Markus Oestreich and Kenneth Østvold kept the lead until the 15^th hour. Then it dropped to third behind the CUPRA of Antti Buri, Olli Kangas, Kari-Pekka Laaksonen and Jordi Gené and the Hyundai of Manuel Lauck, Andreas Gülden, Nicola Larini and Peter Terting that was recovering after a long stop for fixing a gearbox oil leak caused by hitting debris on the track. The three cars ran on the same lap for another three hours until the Audi was stopped by a technical issue.
In vain the Hyundai tried to close the gap from the CUPRA and a long suspension of the race because of the fog did not help their effort.
Eventually the Spanish car crossed the finish line in a brilliant 32^nd position overall (out of 150 starters) with a one-lap margin over the Hyundai. The Bonk Motorsport Audi shared by Hermann Bock, Max Partl, Rainer Partl and Volker Piepmeyer finished third three laps down. 
It is worth remembering that in Qualifying Terting had set a new provisional track record for TCR cars of 8:58.463 that was even faster than the pole position of 8:58.700 set by Thed Björk in the first WTCR Qualifying.