BRC Racing’s Alex Ley claimed a dominant victory in the opening TCR Europe race of the season at Mugello, winning in the dusk by a comfortable margin ahead of Solite Indigo Racing’s Junesung Park.
Ley had earlier claimed pole position on his series début by over four tenths of a second from BRC team-mate Gabriele Covini, and the Brit duly continued that impressive pace in Saturday’s opening race.
When the lights went out, Ley comfortably pulled into a clear lead, as behind him Covini initially assumed second whilst Tiago Pernía stalled his Squadra Martino Honda on the grid and fell from third to the back of the pack.
Junesung Park then dived past Covini for second further around the lap, which also saw some eventful incidents in the mid-pack.
Firstly, Marco Butti lost the back of his CUPRA exiting Turn 3, spinning onto the grass but the Monlau Motorsport driver was able to rejoin.
Further around the lap, Felipe Fernández fell off the circuit but rejoined, and Junui Park made contact with Victor Weyrich, leaving the latter stranded in the gravel whilst Park limped back to the pits with extensive front-left damage.
The incident required a safety car intervention to retrieve Weyrich’s Herrero Racing CUPRA from the gravel, but racing resumed after two laps.
From lap four, Ley quickly eased out a comfortable lead again, at one stage having an advantage of five seconds over the chasing Junesung Park, going on to win on his début in the European series.
Park took second, whilst Covini held third, despite late pressure from Max Hart, making it an all-Hyundai podium.
Reigning TCR Russia champion Mikhail Simonov initially held sixth after racing resumed on lap four, and as Nicolas Taylor began to struggle in front of him he got past the Audi driver, who quickly came under pressure from the chasing ALM Motorsport duo of Mike Halder and Hart.
On lap five, Hart and Halder also passed PMA Motorsport’s Taylor, allowing Simonov to gain some breathing space.
Halder had managed to get back past team-mate Hart, though and a lap later closed in on Simonov and took fifth, before catching and passing Nicola Baldan for fourth a few laps later.
Baldan and Halder continued to battle into the final stages of the race and on the penultimate lap the Italian ran wide at Turn 1 whilst trying to reclaim fourth, allowing Hart into fifth.
Hart then passed Halder on the final lap into Turn 1 and within a few corners was pressuring Covini for third, but with Victor Fernández having gone off into the gravel at the final corner a lap earlier, he couldn’t make a pass at the end and had to settle for fourth.
Halder took the chequered flag in fifth, with Baldan in sixth. Simonov was seventh as the leading CUPRA driver, ahead of Taylor in eighth.
The top ten was completed by Aikoa Racing’s Santiago Concepción and Monlau’s recovering Butti.
Race two gets underway at 11:00 CET (10:00 GMT) on Sunday.
Race result
| POS | NO | CL | NAT | DRIVER | ENTRANT | CAR | LAPS | TIME | BEST | GD |
| 1 | 76 |  |
Alex LEY | BRC Racing Team | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 13 | 29:00.654 | 1:55.672 | 1 | |
| 2 | 97 |  |
Junesung PARK | Solite Indigo Racing | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 13 | 3.291 | 1:57.789 | 5 | |
| 3 | 12 |  |
Gabriele COVINI | BRC Racing Team | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 13 | 3.655 | 1:57.692 | 2 | |
| 4 | 69 |  |
Max HART | ALM Motorsport | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 13 | 4.155 | 1:57.287 | 11 | |
| 5 | 7 |  |
Mike HALDER | ALM Motorsport | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 13 | 5.431 | 1:56.667 | 4 | |
| 6 | 8 | |
Nicola BALDAN | PMA Motorsport | Audi RS3 LMS TCR II | 13 | 5.697 | 1:57.851 | 6 | |
| 7 | 112 |  |
Mikhail SIMONOV | SP Compétition | CUPRA Leon VZ TCR | 13 | 6.153 | 1:57.124 | 13 | |
| 8 | 17 |  |
Nicolas TAYLOR | PMA Motorsport | Audi RS3 LMS TCR II | 13 | 6.434 | 1:57.936 | 10 | |
| 9 | 33 |  |
Santiago CONCEPCIÓN | Aikoa Racing | Audi RS3 LMS TCR II | 13 | 7.093 | 1:58.062 | 16 | |
| 10 | 111 | |
Marco BUTTI | Monlau Motorsport | CUPRA Leon VZ TCR | 13 | 7.562 | 1:57.215 | 7 | |
| 11 | 117 | |
Adam SHEPHERD | Monlau Motorsport | CUPRA Leon VZ TCR | 13 | 14.571 | 1:58.251 | 17 | |
| 12 | 10 |  |
Viktor ANDERSSON | Monlau Motorsport | CUPRA Leon VZ TCR | 13 | 15.119 | 1:58.355 | 9 | |
| 13 | 22 | |
Giacomo PRANDELLI | Aikoa Racing | Audi RS3 LMS TCR II | 13 | 16.203 | 1:58.608 | 18 | |
| 14 | 9 |  |
Tom CHIAPPE | SP Compétition | CUPRA Leon VZ TCR | 13 | 16.674 | 1:57.431 | 21 | |
| 15 | 72 | |
Sandro PELATTI | PMA Motorsport | CUPRA Leon VZ TCR | 13 | 22.667 | 1:59.501 | 23 | |
| 16 | 85 |  |
Tiago PERNÍA | Squadra Martino | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 13 | 22.838 | 1:57.500 | 3 | |
| 17 | 19 | |
Felipe FERNÁNDEZ Gil | Auto Club RC2 Valles | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 13 | 23.513 | 1:58.150 | 15 | |
| 18 | 145 | |
Raphaël FOURNIER | JSB Compétition | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 13 | 24.440 | 1:58.942 | 19 | |
| 19 | 37 |  |
Victor CHAN Chun Leung | Auto Club RC2 Valles | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 13 | 25.842 | 1:59.187 | 20 | |
| 20 | 27 |  |
Ruben VOLT | ALM Motorsport | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 13 | 1:28.048 | 1:57.358 | 12 | |
| 21 | 24 | |
Julien BRICHÉ | JSB Compétition | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 12 | + 1 LAP | 1:58.399 | 24 | |
| 22 | 73 | |
Victor FERNÁNDEZ Gil | Auto Club RC2 Valles | Honda Civic Type-R FL5 TCR | 10 | + 3 LAPS | 1:59.152 | 22 | |
| R | 87 | |
Junui PARK | Solite Indigo Racing | Hyundai Elantra N TCR | 1 | DNF | N/A | 8 | |
| R | 74 | |
Victor WEYRICH | Herrero Racing | CUPRA Leon VZ TCR | 0 | DNF | N/A | 14 |