World Touring Car Cup Archives

The FIA World Touring Car Cup is an international touring car championship promoted by Eurosport Events and sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA), as the highest class of competition for touring cars. This will be the third season under the "World Cup" banner and 16th overall of the series, which dates back to the 2005 World Touring Car Championship.

Teams and drivers[edit]

Summary[edit]

JAS Motorsport and Honda Racing retained their 2019 drivers – Attila Tassi, Tiago Monteiro, Néstor Girolami and Esteban Guerrieri – for the 2020 season. On 5 March it was announced that all four drivers will compete for Münnich Motorsport, who will expand from two cars last season. To meet series regulations the team will be split into two entities – ALL-INKL.DE Münnich Motorsport and ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport – with driver pairings yet to be confirmed. On 2 June announced that Attila Tassi and Tiago Monteiro will join the ALL-INKL.DE Münnich Motorsport and Néstor Girolami and Esteban Guerrieri will remain the ALL-INKL.COM Münnich Motorsport.^[3][17][4]

Volkswagen Motorsport announced that it will cease manufacturer support for the Golf GTI TCR along with all petrol-powered motorsport programmes though the Golf GTI TCR will still be available to private teams. This announcement comes along with the shift of the brand's policy towards electric racing.^[18]Sébastien Loeb Racing, which had run four Golf GTI TCR cars during the 2019 season, announced on 31 January 2020 that will leave the series.^[19]

Audi will not introduce a successor of the RS 3 LMS for 2020, while also ending their manufacturer support in the series though the RS 3 LMS would be still available to private teams. Days before the announcement, W Racing Team, competing under the Audi Sport Team Leopard Racing banner, announced that it ceases participation in the series after the 2019 season to focus on their racing programmes in GT racing and the Deutsche Tourenwagen Masters.^[20][21]

Tom Coronel will remain with Comtoyou Racing, but will switch from CUPRA León TCR to Audi RS 3 LMS TCR. Nathanaël Berthon will return to the WTCR driving for Comtoyou Racing.^[10][9]

Cyan Racing has committed to run four Lynk & Co 03 TCR cars for the season. On 26 March Yann Ehrlacher and Yvan Muller were confirmed as drivers for Cyan Racing Lynk & Co.^[22][7]

Hyundai will be again represented by four Hyundai i30 N TCR entries. BRC Racing Team will scale down to two cars after fielding all four entries last year, entering under the BRC Hyundai N LUKOIL Squadra Corse banner for reigning champion Norbert Michelisz and Gabriele Tarquini. Engstler Motorsport will return to the series for the first time since the 2014 season (back when it was called the World Touring Car Championship) fielding the remaining two Hyundai cars under the Engstler Hyundai N Liqui Moly Racing Team name for Luca Engstler, who will make his full-season début after entering once as a wildcard entry for the 2019 season as well as being replacement for Augusto Farfus at the Macau race weekend last year, and Nick Catsburg. With these changes, Farfus will leave the team.^[1]

CUPRA announced on 3 April 2020 that they would not offer manufacturer support to any team in the 2020 Championship though the new León Competición TCR will be still available to private teams.^[23] On 14 May 2020, it was then announced that a CUPRA Leon Competición TCR would compete in the championship, although teams and drivers yet to be named.^[24] On 30 May 2020, it was announced that Zengő Motorsport would return to the WTCR, running two new León Competición TCR cars, for Bence Boldizs and a yet-to-be-named driver.^[11] It was announced on 28 August that he would be joined by Mikel Azcona and Gabor Kismarty-Lechner in a three-car lineup.^[12]

Jean-Karl Vernay will switch from W Racing Team to Team Mulsanne who will run a single Alfa Romeo Giulietta Veloce TCR.^[14]

Vuković Motorsport will join the grid running a single Renault Mégane R.S TCR for Jack Young.^[2]

Calendar[edit]

A provisional calendar was released on 5 December 2019.^[25]

The 2020 championship is due to be contested over 16 races in six rounds in Europe.^[26] The season was originally planned to be contested over 20 races in 10 rounds, but this changed due to the coronavirus pandemic.^[27]

Rule changes[edit]

Technical changes[edit]

• Compensation weight will be measured differently compared to the previous season with now only the qualifying laps will be counted. Previously a combination of both the qualifying and race laps was used to determine the compensation weight. The change comes to avoid teams instructing drivers to set slower race laps. The Balance of Performance parameters for the cars will remain unaffected.^[28]
• Goodyear is set to become the series' tyre supplier, replacing Yokohama after a fourteen-year tenure as Yokohama elected to concentrate on developing tyres for the Super Formula and Super GT championships. Teams will have a set of 18 new tyres for the opening round of the season, with the number being decreased to 12 for the remaining rounds.^[29][30]

Sporting changes[edit]

• For the first time since the 2010 World Touring Car Championship, a rookie category will be introduced in the series. Drivers under the age of 23 will be eligible as long as they have not raced in more than three race weekends in the series prior to this season.^[28]
• The three-race schedule, that was used for the last two seasons, was cut down to two, citing cost-cutting measures, reducing the number of races from thirty to twenty. As a result, only a single qualifying session will be held. The race length for Race 2 would be three laps longer than Race 1 as a direct result of the reduced number of events.^[30]
• Teams running two cars are restricted to 12-man personnel with three-car teams allowed 18-man personnel. The number of personnel working on the cars, wearing designated armbands, is restricted to ten.^[30]
• Teams will now be allowed to enter one car for the 2020 season.^[31]

Results[edit]

Championship standings[edit]

Scoring system

Drivers' championship[edit]

The FIA World Touring Car Cup (abbreviated to WTCR, referring to the use of TCR regulations) is an international touring car championship promoted by Eurosport Events and sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). It has had different incarnation of a World Touring Car Cup held between 1993 and 1995. Following the 2017 season, an agreement was reached for the World Touring Car Championship to become WTCR and use the TCR technical regulations. With titles for drivers and teams only, the WTCR series changed to 'World Cup' rather than 'World Championship' status in 2018.^[1]

History[edit]

Touring Car World Cup (1993–1995)[edit]

In 1993, with the high popularity of the Super Touring category, the FIA hosted the FIA Touring Car World Cup — an annual event for touring car drivers hailing from national championships all over the world. The 1993 race at Monza was won by New Zealand's Paul Radisich, at the wheel of a Ford Mondeo ahead of Nicola Larini's Alfa Romeo 155, with no manufacturer title awarded. The race was run for two more years, (won by Paul Radisich again in 1994 at Donington Park in a Ford Mondeo, manufacturer title went to BMW, and Frank Biela in 1995 at Paul Ricard in an Audi A4 Quattro, and manufacturer title went to Audi). A similar event was planned for 1996 at the A1 Ring, Austria, but was cancelled due to a low number of provisional entries (10 cars). It was never brought back thereafter.

World Touring Car Championship (2005–2017)[edit]

World Touring Car Cup (2018–present)[edit]

On 6 December 2017, during the FIA's World Motorsport Council in Paris, it was approved the formation of the new World Touring Car Cup starting from 2018. The new series would utilize the TCR rules, which have been in use in numerous national and international touring car racing series, including the TCR International Series. As a result of the formation of the WTCR, both the WTCC in its current format and the TCR International Series would be discontinued immediately.^[2]

A new format was introduced, with one qualifying session and one race on the first day and a three-phase qualifying session on the second day and two races, with the first one having the top 10 of the grid reversed.^[3][4]

Rules[edit]

Car homologation[edit]

Cars have to be production models, with a minimum production of 5000 samples in a year. The engine is limited to a displacement of up to 2 liters, turbo charged, and with the aid of restrictors, to a maximum yield of 350 Hp. Each car is assigned a minimum racing weight which is used to balance the performances.

Scoring system[edit]

For the 2019 season, FIA WTCR races are awarded the following points, similar to MotoGP scoring system.:^[5][6]

Champions[edit]

Event winners[edit]

World Touring Car Cup (2018–present)[edit]

See also[edit]

References[edit]

• Autosport, January 14, 1988

External links[edit]