Motorsport: Stefano Comini remains TCR champion
Less than twelve hours after Neel Jani, Switzerland can celebrate another international automobile champion. Stefano Comini decided the international TCR series in his favor in Macau, as he did last year. He kept his promise and had his beard shaved off. The international championship for TCR touring cars with two-liter turbo engines and front-wheel drive has the blessing of the FIA, [...]
The international championship for TCR touring cars with two-liter turbocharged engines and front-wheel drive has the blessing of the FIA, but not the predicate of a world championship. Since it is held worldwide, Stefano Comini can still feel like a world champion - and the 26-year-old from Lugano in Ticino knows what that's like from last year. The 6.2-kilometer street circuit in Macau is considered one of the most difficult race tracks in the world, hardly forgiving mistakes. Stefano Comini's approach was correspondingly clever. In the wet qualifying session, Jean-Karl Vernay and he took the places on the front row of the grid with their VW Golf. Stefano Comini won the first race, which was interrupted due to accidents. In the second and similarly chaotic race, he finished a safe fourth.
After winning the title fell long hair as promised
As both races did not go the full distance due to the yellow phases, only half points were awarded, but the two results were enough to win the title again. Before the finale, Stefano Comini was 17 points behind James Nash in the Seat Leon, and on Sunday evening the driver from southern Switzerland had 3.5 points more on his tally than the Briton. Last year, Comini had become the first TCR International Series champion at the same venue with a race win, then in a Seat Leon. In 2016, Comini switched as a professional to the Italian Leopard Racing team, which enjoys factory support from Volkswagen Motorsport: "In 2015, I took more risks, this year I became champion more with my head. Moreover, it was a tremendous team effort, because we worked hard to develop the new VW Golf into a winning car." And Stefano Comini kept his word (AutoSprintCH reported): The evening after winning the title again, his long hair and full beard fell victim to the scissors.
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Photos: TCR
