The 2020 TCR Europe calendar has been revealed, featuring seven events taking place in six different countries across Europe between April and October.
Sticking to the same seven-event formula as in each of the past two seasons, the 2020 TCR Europe calendar features five of the same circuits as in 2019.
Returning to the calendar is Le Castellet, which hosted the season opener in 2018, whilst Zolder in Belgium is a new addition to the series with a date in mid-September.
The season gets underway at Spa-Francorchamps in late April to early May, with the series supporting the second running of the TCR Spa 500 event, resulting in track action on Friday and Saturday for the season opener.
The second event is at the Red Bull Ring in Austria in mid-May, before the series also returns to Oschersleben in Germany in late June.
The fourth event, at Circuit Paul Ricard in July, will be part of the European Le Mans Series weekend.
The event at Zolder supports the FIA European Truck Championship, whilst the final two events are at the now-regular venues of Monza and Barcelona in September and October respectively, supporting the GT Open and Blancpain GT Series respectively.
In addition to the calendar announcement, a number of minor tweaks have been made to the format. The race distance will change from being 23 minutes plus one lap to a fixed distance of 55 kilometres.
The first two laps run under a safety car will see those laps added on to the race distance, whilst the number of full-season entries will be limited to 30 cars. During 2019 the grid size only dropped below 30 cars for the events at the Red Bull Ring (29 cars) and Oschersleben (28 cars).
“The large participation and the level of competition we enjoyed in 2019 proved that the format works well, which is why we have stuck to the seven events on an attractive set of racetracks,” said promoter Paulo Ferreira.
“At Spa, for the first time the series will share the bill with an endurance race for TCR cars, and we hope that some of our teams and drivers will be willing to try the experience of a long-distance race.
“Another important addition is the event at Zolder with the FIA European Truck Championship that will provide another opportunity of racing in front of a huge crowd.
“We have also worked on the Sporting Regulations with the aim of improving the series under all the aspects, from the management to the racing itself.”
The deadline for entries is April 12th.
2020 TCR Europe Series – calendar
30 April/2 May – Spa-Francorchamps
15/17 May – Red Bull Ring
26/28 June – Oschersleben
17/19 July – Le Castellet
11/13 September – Zolder
25/27 September – Monza
9/11 October – Barcelona