A 5-round calendar has been unveiled ahead of the TCR Asia Series’ fourth season, including a new 3-round South-East Asia Cup for the events set to be contested in Malaysia and Thailand.
The calendar has encompassed Asia’s 3 national TCR championships with a pair of rounds set to be held in Thailand alongside TCR Thailand, whilst a round each are set to be contested with the TCR China field and the newly announced TCR Korea series.
Sepang will maintain its fixture as the season opener, a position the Malaysian circuit has held since the introduction of the series, whilst the 2 proceeding rounds at Buriram and Bangsaen in Thailand will complete the schedule for the SEA Cup.
The series will then head north for South Korea as the series heads to the Korea International Circuit , the series returning to Korea for the first time since 2016, before rounding off its official calendar in Shanghai at the start of October.
“For 2018 we wanted to focus on consistency and continuing to assist the national series with their emerging markets,” explains WSC Asia Limited’s David Sonenscher, “For Asia, there is now the addition in 2018 of TCR Korea – which will join us for the fourth event of the year to give their teams the opportunity to compete against Asia’s best.”
A sixth invitational round, the SIC888 Endurance race in Shanghai, has also been included as a further incentive for teams although the race will not count towards the championship.
“We’re also fielding regular requests for information from new and established Asian teams, so interest is strong,” continues Sonenscher, “some of that enquiry centres around endurance racing for which the TCR cars have become popular in Europe, so in addition to the five-event TCR Asia program, we have an established link with the new SIC888 endurance event in Shanghai that will allow TCR Asia teams to get preferential opportunities to follow on from the season finale immediately ahead of the 888-kilometre race.”
