TCR World and life

INTERVIEW 30 Of the hundreds of TCR drivers from around the world, one of the most experienced has to be Daniel Lloyd. Not only has the 28 year old Englishman competed at every level of the TCR ‘pyramid’ - championships ranging from International to Regional to National - but Lloyd also won the TCR UK title in 2018, came within a whisker of taking the TCR Malaysia title this year and twice took part in the Balance of Performance tests as the nominated neutral driver, so knows the various TCR cars better than most. Dan made his TCR debut in Austria around halfway through the 2017 TCR International Series season when he stepped into the Lukoil Craft Bamboo team to replace Hugo Valente in the team’s third SEAT Léon. He might have been playing a supporting role to Pepe Oriola and James Nash, but Lloyd credits that half-season with getting his Touring Car career started. “Before 2017, I was going down the GT route,” he explained. “I’d competed in British GT, the Blancpain series and the likes so to make the jump to Touring Cars was a bit unusual, but I could see a career in it for me because I could see it was going somewhere. Since then, I’ve competed in a total of five TCR championships, taken part in two BoP tests and got a lot of work as either a driver coach or in technical development, so I guess I made the right decision!” In the first part of the current season Dan was fighting for the TCR Malaysia title going into the final round; he eventually finished level on points with Luca Engstler and lost out to the young German driver on the latter’s higher number of race wins. “I was very disappointed at the time, ” he recalls. “The tactics that were used is what happens in motorsport, but the contacts were the disappointing part. I think the odds were against me because of the speed difference between the Honda and the Hyundai but I still thought I was in with a chance. I drove the best I had done for a long time, but the end result was out of my hands. It was a great experience though, as I think the TCR Malaysia championship is actually a great series because of the