TCR World and life

30 ENDURANCE In 2020, there comes a brand new TCR championship: the TCR DSG Europe endurance series – this new series caters for the high number of Volkswagen Group cars still in circulation that run with the cost- effective Direct-Shift Gearbox (DSG), and embraces a new, although some might even call it more traditional, race format. The series will be promoted by the same organisation behind the highly successful TCR Europe Touring Car Series, and caters for longer distance races, with two drivers per car, immediately making it one of cheapest, high-profile championships for an aspiring touring car driver looking to further their career. “The DSG endurance series makes use Newseriesrevamps interestforDSGcars LONG DISTANCE RACING COMES BACK TO EUROPEWITH TCR of the success of the DSG-class cars, and from the success of the series they launched in Italy last year,” said promoter Paulo Ferreira. “It will be a good championship to join our TCR Europe sprint series and if you look at the level in terms of costs compared to the TCR Europe series, with the endurance series, and with its DSG cars, you’re looking at a budget of around 50-60% of that right from the start, and then from the drivers’ perspective, with two drivers sharing, that’s immediately another 50% ‘discount’.” The series will share its framework for four of the five rounds with the TCR DSG Italy Championship. “In the future, we could share the same circuits with TCR Europe, and then with the TCR DSG Europe endurance series racing together, we can start to share a lot of things,” said Ferreira. “That would mean that one team could be involved in both series - running two, three or four cars in each. And from an organisational standpoint, we can share our structure, the staff, which will help us to grow the series. I believe there is a market out there in Europe for both a sprint and endurance touring car series – and in three to four years’ time, we’ll see if I’m right.” Following in the footsteps of the successful TCR DSG Italy Championship, which drew an average entry of 20 cars per race last year, Ferreira believes this new,