The Liqui Moly Team Engstler Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR won the opening round of the 24H TCE Series, the 24H Dubai.
TCR International Series champion Jean-Karl Vernay and Benjamin Leuchter, the winner of the TCR class in the VLN series, shared driving duties with TCR Germany regulars Luca Engstlerand Florian Thoma.
The winning quartet crossed the finishing line two laps ahead of the LMS Racing SEAT León TCR DSG driven by Olli Kangas, Kari-Pekka Laaksonen, Antti Buri and Willem Meijer, after a close battle that lasted throughout the whole race.
The Bonk MotorsportAudi RS3 LMS DSG of Hermann Bock, Max Partl, Rainer Partl, Volker Piepmeyer and Michael Bonk finished third, 12 laps behind, in a TCR podium lockout that also saw three different manufacturers finish in the top three. The fourth place went to the Lap57 Motorsports Audi RS3 LMS DSG that was followed by the two Peugeot 308 Racing Cup cars of reigning TCR champions Team Altran Peugeot.
The Honda Civic Type R TCR run by RKC/TGM Motorsport, retired prematurely with a broken head gasket on its competitive world debut.
The winning Volkswagen completed 556 laps and was classified 24th overall (out of the 89 starters) behind the most powerful GT cars, but ahead of many other GTs.
The next round of the 24H TCE Series will be the 24H Silverstone, 9-10-11 March.
