2018 TCR UK

[touring fan01]

Originally Posted by jsmee

So the fact only a handful of VW Racing Cup cars turned up at their media day, does that mean that championship is also a farce?

Yes the championship overpromised to start with, but no championship in its first year can be expected to perform with massive grids on day 1, its just unrealistic. Especially in a flooded motorsport championships market in the UK.

The real test is who turns up to Race 1, not Test 1.

no, in fact the real test is how many actually do the whole season and not just race 1.

[jsmee]

Originally Posted by touring fan01

no, in fact the real test is how many actually do the whole season and not just race 1.

Then why are you so quick to judge the championship's success?

[touring fan01]

Originally Posted by jsmee

Then why are you so quick to judge the championship's success?

because its ‘success’ already speaks for itself.

any big new high profile championship that 8 months after it was announced and hyped up has so far managed to get a paltry 7 cars on the track is already a failure. lets face it it’s not as if there is a lack of cars available!

[S griffin]

As good as it would be to have the series happen, it really needed more cars running at this test or at least more seats announced and I can't help but feel this is a battle that has already been lost

[Alfisti]

Everything about this says there is no championship. It'll be a few car farce if the meetings actually happen; face facts, it's stillborn. Sadly.

If itv had 7 people roll up to audition for x factor in total do you think the program would run or be cancelled?

If Manchester United only had 7 players would a game go ahead?

This is the reality, there'll be more marshalls per corner than competitors! 😕

[tux]

Itll be just like the UK LMP3 cup

[Sodemo]

Originally Posted by geordiecriag101

For anyone who interested, here's my vid from the days test.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xIBu9RAKgw

Thanks for the video. TCR cars do sound a bit better than the NGTC cars (in my opinion).

[touring fan01]

at the end of an article about TCR UK printed Motorsport News (MN) today, regarding cancelling media day etc, it says;

"MN understands a total of five drivers have confirmed interest in starting the season. The series confirmed it will run regardless of number of enries"

5 cars! what a farce.

[Mark0994]

Originally Posted by touring fan01

at the end of an article about TCR UK printed Motorsport News (MN) today, regarding cancelling media day etc, it says;

"MN understands a total of five drivers have confirmed interest in starting the season. The series confirmed it will run regardless of number of enries"

5 cars! what a farce.

Agree.
It's 2001 BTC-T class of prime UK championship all over again.

[touring fan01]

Originally Posted by Mark0994

Agree.
It's 2001 BTC-T class of prime UK championship all over again.

yes, so they need to combine it with another series.

[S griffin]

Originally Posted by Alfisti

Everything about this says there is no championship. It'll be a few car farce if the meetings actually happen; face facts, it's stillborn. Sadly.

If itv had 7 people roll up to audition for x factor in total do you think the program would run or be cancelled?

If Manchester United only had 7 players would a game go ahead?

This is the reality, there'll be more marshalls per corner than competitors! 😕

Well a football game can go ahead providing at least 7 players are on the pitch

[crmalcolm]

Originally Posted by Alfisti

If Manchester United only had 7 players would a game go ahead?

Yes - the game would be started.


If only 6 cars bothered to take the start in F1 - would the race go ahead?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5DRJWw0R_w

[S griffin]

Gee it’s hard not to shed a tear at the memory of that six car race

[V8 Fireworks]

Originally Posted by jsmee

Yes the championship overpromised to start with, but no championship in its first year can be expected to perform with massive grids on day 1,

It's in start contrast to the 40 car grids of the German TCR seris: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ce4haCCSgVg& It's really weird TBH.

Originally Posted by touring fan01

because its ‘success’ already speaks for itself.

any big new high profile championship that 8 months after it was announced and hyped up has so far managed to get a paltry 7 cars on the track is already a failure. lets face it it’s not as if there is a lack of cars available!

Yes, it's very curious why do German (mostly amateur owner-driver) drivers love the class so much, but the British do not? Weird.

[Alfisti]

Originally Posted by S griffin

Gee it’s hard not to shed a tear at the memory of that six car race

Almost as an act of God trying to save my soul I was spared that joke by a powercut! 😀

[Alfisti]

Presumably some of the popularity in Germany is because DTM is very far away in cost terms?

Certainly from figures bandied about BTCC vs TCR UK isn't massively different? I refer to the supposed 200k cost of a #HARD ride, not a WSR ride!

[touring fan01]

Originally Posted by V8 Fireworks

Yes, it's very curious why do German (mostly amateur owner-driver) drivers love the class so much, but the British do not? Weird.

one reason is probably because they dont have a long established high-profile major national touring car championship that those teams and drivers could enter for not much more money than it costs to do a TCR series.

[redshoes]

Originally Posted by V8 Fireworks

Yes, it's very curious why do German (mostly amateur owner-driver) drivers love the class so much, but the British do not? Weird.

TCR is Germany is effectively the top level touring car series, or least as far as amateur drivers are concerned. I'm discounting DTM here as that's basically just manufacturer teams and the odd privateer with a mega budget. In the UK, anyone with the budget would much rather be in BTCC or a series with a higher profile, like Clio Cup.

If BTCC was to run to TCR regs (and I don't want to start that debate) then car numbers wouldn't be an issue.

It's not the TCR regs itself that is the problem, it's more how the series in the UK is positioned and what alternatives there are.

[GCCheddaris]

One possible problem after yesterday's test , apart from the small number of cars , is that the TCR cars were lapping in almost identical times to the fastest laps set by the BTCC contenders last year . I suppose it will come down to what budget is required and who the series is aimed at , as performance wise the cars are virtually identical.

[mark_l]

Originally Posted by Alfisti

Everything about this says there is no championship. It'll be a few car farce if the meetings actually happen; face facts, it's stillborn. Sadly.



If itv had 7 people roll up to audition for x factor in total do you think the program would run or be cancelled?



If Manchester United only had 7 players would a game go ahead?



This is the reality, there'll be more marshalls per corner than competitors!

At some circuits there could be more corners than competitors


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Woolley]

Originally Posted by touring fan01

one reason is probably because they dont have a long established high-profile major national touring car championship that those teams and drivers could enter for not much more money than it costs to do a TCR series.

And a huge range of other amateur classes they can run in for a lot less.

Hopefully more will turn up, but the repetitive problem of all of these series that start up is that someone is expecting to make money from it, an extremely poor grid is put out, yet they still expect marshals to give their time for free to support their venture. If they can't raise a full grid, then merge with something else until they can or don't run at all.

[medius]

One of the Motorbase Golfs is now officially listed for sale on Racecars Direct, asking price is £110k plus VAT.

https://www.racecarsdirect.com/Advert/Details/91325/tcr-vw-golf---motorbase-performance

[Moneyseeker]

Originally Posted by redshoes

TCR is Germany is effectively the top level touring car series, or least as far as amateur drivers are concerned. I'm discounting DTM here as that's basically just manufacturer teams and the odd privateer with a mega budget. In the UK, anyone with the budget would much rather be in BTCC or a series with a higher profile, like Clio Cup.

If BTCC was to run to TCR regs (and I don't want to start that debate) then car numbers wouldn't be an issue.

It's not the TCR regs itself that is the problem, it's more how the series in the UK is positioned and what alternatives there are.

Quite. Ideally F4 should be swiched from the BTCC support to F3 support as that is more relevant for drivers that want to progress and TCR should be a support to BTCC - maybe positioned as the National Saloon Car Cup or similar (like the old national saloons Grp N's were) then career saloon car drivers could progress from Clio's to TCR to BTCC within the same structure. There would be economy of scale for BTCC teams to run TCR cars. TOCA probably never agree, but you could create a progression there.

[AdrianM]

It would be hard to have a progression when, to the average punter, there's no real difference between the cars.

[touring fan01]

Originally Posted by Moneyseeker

Quite. Ideally F4 should be swiched from the BTCC support to F3 support as that is more relevant for drivers that want to progress and TCR should be a support to BTCC - maybe positioned as the National Saloon Car Cup or similar (like the old national saloons Grp N's were) then career saloon car drivers could progress from Clio's to TCR to BTCC within the same structure. There would be economy of scale for BTCC teams to run TCR cars. TOCA probably never agree, but you could create a progression there.

but that doesn’t change the main problem that TCR is just too expensive when drivers can get in the BTCC for around the same cost.