2019 TCR Australia Silly Season

[pimmy]

What do you mean, "great while they lasted"? They still happen!

I like this series so far. The organisers have actually put effort into attracting a quality entry and it's presented well. Just a shame that the Aussies have ad-breaks during the live TV coverage, which isn't acceptable when the races are 25 minutes long.

[one five five]

Who are in the MPC cars for the next round?

[twinwebbers]

Two more Audis. Over twenty cars in the country now.

[Mixer]

Maybe controversial but instead of replacing Supercars as some have claimed, could TCR actually kill off AGT?

Pretty killer platform for the well heeled to arrive and drive. Better than spending half a million to go fast until the next guy gets a better rig.

And by comparison crashes are not going to cost a lot.

Sent from my SM-G975F using Tapatalk

[Axeman444]

Originally Posted by Mixer

Maybe controversial but instead of replacing Supercars as some have claimed, could TCR actually kill off AGT?

Pretty killer platform for the well heeled to arrive and drive. Better than spending half a million to go fast until the next guy gets a better rig.

And by comparison crashes are not going to cost a lot.

Sent from my SM-G975F using Tapatalk

Not quite so much "phwoar"/penis envy with these though compared with GT

[Mixer]

Yeah, but I think GT is in decline because of hugely rising costs of the latest toy, and a tightening of the economy. I think guys like MSR and MPC are on the money with this model.

[one five five]

Originally Posted by Mixer

Maybe controversial but instead of replacing Supercars as some have claimed, could TCR actually kill off AGT?

Pretty killer platform for the well heeled to arrive and drive. Better than spending half a million to go fast until the next guy gets a better rig.

And by comparison crashes are not going to cost a lot.

TCR was designed to replicate the success of GT3 and TCR's principle's are a copy just with a different section of the car market

Any problems GT3 have will likely have the same outcome in TCR

[Umai Naa]

Not when the cars are a third of the price to buy and run.

They're also trying to reign in Lynk & Co, for not entirely conforming to the spirit of the rules, but this is difficult when they're only running in WTCR where the rulemakers aren't acting in the best interests of the core principles of TCR.

[Compromised]

Originally Posted by one five five

Any problems GT3 have will likely have the same outcome in TCR

Except maybe cost? Any ideas on comparative costs between each series for running a season?

[V8 Fireworks]

Originally Posted by Mixer

Yeah, but I think GT is in decline because of hugely rising costs of the latest toy, and a tightening of the economy. I think guys like MSR and MPC are on the money with this model.

Surely Australian GT's problem is their active discouragement of professional driver entries. It's some kind of club for wealthy amateurs rather than a serious professional series... With such mentality it can never be a true headline series, and will remain primarily for the benefit of competitors rather than for the benefit of spectators and true commercial sponsors.

But, when you load GT3 cars with A-grade drivers who push them flat out, the public and genuine commercial sponsorship is very much interested -- the Bathurst 12 hour shows this.

TCR unlike AGT, has no driver grade restrictions and is all the better for it.

I think AGT could be a premier Australian class in it's own right if all A-driver lineups were permitted.

Frankly, give AGT & the 12 hour to ARG. Let them package combined TCR & AGT race weekends for the public, TCR as a support class at the 12 hour too. Almost certainly, the TCR/AGT/12hr series package WILL attract trackside advertising and television broadcast sponsorship from BMW, Mercedes, Audi, Hyundai, Honda and maybe others. Likewise, it will gleefully deprive Supercars of those same dollars... Win, win all round to break Supercars dominance!

[rich07]

Originally Posted by Mixer

Yeah, but I think GT is in decline because of hugely rising costs of the latest toy, and a tightening of the economy. I think guys like MSR and MPC are on the money with this model.

In Aus GT case it’s not just costs that are its problem. Disgruntled competitors (past and present) being a big one. When you have people that can afford to race in AGT but would rather spend their money elsewhere because of unhappiness in how the category is run then it’s apparent cost isn’t the only issue.

[Mark Petch]

Originally Posted by Compromised

Except maybe cost? Any ideas on comparative costs between each series for running a season?

Hi,

I have run both car's, admittedly only one 3 hour endurance so far in our Hyundai i30N TCR car, but a season in our Gen2 Audi R8 GT3 car. Audi Sport advise R8 car owners to charge A$18 per kilometre, just to cover component lifeing.

Given that a new GT3 car cost in excess of A$600K plus spares etc, and on average has a useful life of say, 3 maybe 4 years, then the return on investment alone has to be at least $100K per year if not more to cover the significant depreciation of the car over 3 years.

A new Audi TCR car cost A$250K, and cost about one third of the cost to run in terms of lifeing, principally because the critical components, such as the VAG engine, cost less than A$10K complete with new turbo etc.

Tire and brake cost's are approximately one third the cost because the rear end does very little work, and in our first 3 hour race we only used a total of 6 tires at A$430 each. The front brake pads do a lot of work as does the front tires, so a new set of front brake pads for the race weekend, plus the rear brake pads are so tiny they also need replacing after a 3 hour racer but they are less than half the cost of the front pad's, so again not a big expense.

Fuel cost are similar but TCR engines are quite happy running on BP98 pump gas, so fuels not a big cost component.

TCR races are normally sprint racing events so no need for expensive refuelling rigs and the associated manpower needed to refuel are needed, so big saving on manpower needed to run the car.

You are not allowed ABS, or telemetry, or centre lock wheels so spare wheels are "Cheap as chips" $A400 each for for BRAID wheels, which are the OE supplied factory wheel.

Summing it all up, TCR racing budgets should be around one third of a GT3 car, and even less if you buy a good second hand car for say A$175K.

Cheers,

Mark.

[Sandgroper]

Great insight Mark.

Its definitely gaining momentum.

[Compromised]

Thank you Mark, very interesting stuff.

[Average Punter]

$18/km??

Holy smoke! 312 laps at the 12-Hour. That's $35K just for the car. No fuel. No personnel. No crashes. No entry fee. No paid drivers. No coffee machines. No overalls.

No wonder TCR is getting a foothold...

[E.B]

Originally Posted by Average Punter

$18/km??

Holy smoke! 312 laps at the 12-Hour. That's $35K just for the car. No fuel. No personnel. No crashes. No entry fee. No paid drivers. No coffee machines. No overalls.

No wonder TCR is getting a foothold...

And you have to include any testing, practice and qualifying laps as well, so the 'lifeing' cost increases pro rata

[Mark Petch]

Originally Posted by Average Punter

$18/km??

Holy smoke! 312 laps at the 12-Hour. That's $35K just for the car. No fuel. No personnel. No crashes. No entry fee. No paid drivers. No coffee machines. No overalls.

No wonder TCR is getting a foothold...

Its the reason I sold my GT3 car, as the real costs are unrecoverable. We looked at doing the Bathurst 12 hour, however when we ran the spread sheet on it came to 250K, without any crash damage provision!

[mayhem]

Is there much variation of costs among the marques in TCR Mark?

[Mark Petch]

Originally Posted by mayhem

Is there much variation of costs among the marques in TCR Mark?

I am far from an expert, however, given that the lowest cost brand new TCR race car is a Seat, and that use the exact same VAG [VW] engine as does the VW and Audi TCR cars.

So the biggest cost differential would surely have to be the cost of spare parts. The Audi S3 is the most expensive brand new TCR car, and I am told that the Audi composite panels are very expensive.

The Hyundai i30N uses an Xtrac transmission which is more expensive to purchase than the Sadev transmission, but require less maintenance, so its swings and round about's from what I can see.

[mayhem]

Sweet, thanks mate.

[mayhem]

Originally Posted by Mark Petch

Audi Sport advise R8 car owners to charge A$18 per kilometre, just to cover component lifeing.


Cheers,

Mark.

So still cheaper than a Sydney cab in peak hour then?

[KA]

Originally Posted by twinwebbers

Two more Audis. Over twenty cars in the country now.

...and Garth Tander in one of them for Philip Island...

https://www.speedcafe.com/2019/06/02...ustralia-grid/

[S griffin]

That is a big boost to have a name like Tander in the series, so that's great news

[BobJones]

As I've said before, those Subaru's are utter crap. But also, the Kelly's should have worked out before purchasing if they could reach lower weight limits - with compensation weights being key to the TCR formula.

Running an overweight car is a big handicap, Heimgartner drove the wheels off the turd box at round one!

https://www.speedcafe.com/2019/06/03...w-weight-regs/

[Umai Naa]

They don't own them.

Whilst the cars have shown some potential, I'm certain Top Run are glad they're gone.