The addition of Audis for Felice Jelmini and Giacomo Ghermandi, and a Hyundai for Giovanni Scamardi, means the TCR Europe field will expand to 14 cars for this weekend’s event at Monza.
The penultimate race event of the season will see a field made up of ten Audis, two Hyundais, one Honda and one Lynk & Co take on the legendary Italian circuit.
Although 28-year-old Italian Jelmini competed full-time in the 2021 and 2022 TCR Europe seasons, missing only last year’s season finale, this weekend’s event marks his first appearance in the regional series this year.
Jelmini has instead focussed on racing in TCR Italy this year, where he sits fourth overall in the drivers’ standings, still very much in title contention, after scoring one win at Mugello and a podium at Monza last time out.
His compatriot Ghermandi is also returning to the series in which he last raced in 2022, although the 38-year-old’s record is not as impressive, having scored a best finish of 15th prior to this weekend – something he will at least improve on provided he finishes a race this weekend.
Ghermandi has focussed on racing in TCR Eastern Europe this year, where he scored a podium finish at Most last month.
29-year-old Belgian Scamardi is in his first year of TCR racing, and has until now focused on racing in TCR Italy with Aggressive Team Italia, yielding a best result of ninth.
He will partner young Hungarian Levente Losonczy in the Italian outfit, with Losonczy also taking on a full season in Italy but also having found the time to contest the past three TCR Europe events as well, where he took a maiden top ten result last time out at Circuit Paul Ricard.
Volcano Motorsport will sport an all-Ukrainian line-up for the first time, with Daniel Tkachenko, son of team owner Andrei, joined by Ivan Peklin. Peklin takes the Audi previously raced by Lewis Brown, the Brit having switched to Comtoyou Racing, which is now fielding six cars, this weekend.
Spaniards Rubén Fernández Gil and Felipe Fernández Gil had appeared on the original entry list for this weekend, but will now not take part in the event.