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Another dramatic race was offered by the TCR Eastern Europe championship at Hungaroring. René Kircher from Mertel Motorsport crossed the finish line in third place, behind his teammate Davit Kajaia and leader Adam Kout. However, both Kajaia and Kout received time penalties, and the German driver Kircher became the fourth winner of the season.
The front row on the grid belonged to Sebastian Steibel from Aditis Racing and Petr Čížek from Expres Auto Racing team. Behind them, it was all about the Hyundai Janík Motorsport team, with Adam Kout in third position and championship leader Maťo Homola fourth. The third row was locked by Mertel Motorsport, with Davit Kajaia fifth and René Kircher sixth.
At the start, Tobias Poschik and Petr Fulín Jr. had a very slow start and caused a bit of chaos for the drivers behind them. Luckily, there were no accidents. Adam Kout had the best start with his Hyundai Elantra and went into the lead in the first turn, where again, there were many drivers side by side. The fight for the lead continued throughout the first lap between Kout, Steibel, and Kircher, while Kout cut the chicane, which was the reason for his ten-second penalty after the race.
Homola dropped to fifth place, but he tried to get to the front as quickly as possible and used all his experience to pass the drivers in front of him. However, he had a slight contact with other cars during the opening moments of the race, and part of his bodywork under the doors was loose and hanging off his Elantra. He continued in fourth place as he passed Steibel´s Audi.
Meanwhile, Kout was leading, but right behind him was the Honda Civic duo, led by Kajaia and Kircher. A little further back were Homola and Steibel. Sixth was Ghermandi, who was defending his position from yesterday’s winner Milan Vukovic. Vukovic managed to pass him, Carlo Czepiel tried for the same, but there was a contact between Elantra and Audi. Czepiel had a puncture and went to the pits for a tire change and later after the race received 30 second-penalty for causing the collision.
After Czepiel’s pit stop and Homola’s loose bodywork, another bad news came for Hyundai Janik Motorsport team. It was confirmed that Kout would receive a ten-second penalty for cutting the chicane. It was clear that Kout wouldn’t win the race unless he created more than a 10-second gap from second-placed Kajaija. But Kajaia kept pace with his teammate Kircher and followed Kout closely. Another surprise came when Kajaia received a two-second penalty for track limits, which promoted third-placed Kircher to first place.
During the later stage of the race, Ghermandi had a problem with his right rear wheel after the contact with Czepiel and was driving a little bit sideways. However, he continued on the track, although Audi wasn’t clearly in good shape. Petr Fulín Junior tried to pass him for twelfth position, but Ghermandi defended his position very hard, even though his car was going sideways. Fulín eventually didn’t manage to pass him.
As the chequered flag was shown after 25-minute sprint race, René Kircher became the winner in front of Davit Kajaia. Maťo Homola was promoted to third place after Kout’s penalty, which dropped him to fourth place. Race 1 winner Milan Vukovic finished fifth. Sixth was Petr Čížek, and from twentieth to seventh position drove Milenko Vukovic. TCR Eastern Europe debutant Philipp Dietrich scored another points for eighth position, Tobias Poschik was ninth and one point for tenth place went to Sebastian Steibel.
René Kircher also won Junior class with Milan Vukovic second and Philipp Dietrich third. Trophy class for older cars was won by Tobias Poschik in front of Sebastian Kolakowski and Adam Rzepecki.
