Mazda joins global TCR racing action

The new Mazda3 could be racing in Australia next year despite a lack of official interest from Mazda Australia.

The car has just been cleared for competition in the USA, where it has been developed to suit the global TCR competition rules for production-based compact cars with front-wheel drive and turbocharged 2.0-litre engines.

Initially, the car is intended for the IMSA Michelin Pilot Challenge, where it will debut in a four-hour endurance race at Daytona, Florida.

But there is huge global interest in the Mazda3 track contender, as Mazda is one of the late arrivals in TCR racing and joins 12 other brands -- from Alfa Romeo and Audi through Hyundai to Volkswagen -- with cars in some of the 36 TCR-sanctioned series around the world.

Toyota and Ford are now the only major brands without a TCR contender.

Mazda’s potential involvement in TCR has been a talking point since the start of the inaugural season of the carsales TCR Australia Series, with several teams expressing an interest in the car once it became available.

Now the news from America is expected to fan the flames for a series assault in 2020, although Mazda Australia is pouring cold water on any involvement.

“We have got no plans to buy any cars or race any as Mazda Australia,” the marketing director of Mazda Australia, Alistair Doak, tells carsales.

Even so, Mazda would not block a private team which wanted to race the car.

“That’s absolutely fine. It’s a great looking car,” says Doak.

“Anybody is free to buy and race one. It would be nice to see it racing but we don’t have any plans.”

Mazda’s TCR program in the USA is being run through Long Road Racing, which has previously been responsible for building cars for the Global Mazda MX-5 Cup series.

Mazda USA is competing in a number of high-profile championships in the US, including the top-level IMSA Sports Car Championship for Le Mans-style prototypes, and has a long racing history in America.

Its commitment to the TCR series is reflected in an official unveiling of the Mazda3 racer at Mazda Design in California, following design and development work at the facility in Irvine.

“TCR represents a great opportunity for us to showcase the new Mazda3 and provide our customers another avenue to race Mazda Vehicles,” says Masahiro Moro, CEO of Mazda North America.

In the USA, one of Mazda’s direct rivals will be Hyundai, which has developed a TCR version of its latest Veloster coupe. That car could be coming to Australia, too, with strong interest from the HMO Customer Racing team which has dominated the local series this year with Will Brown in a Hyundai i30 N.

Mazda Australia is aware of the program in the USA, having previously purchased cars from Long Road Racing.

“They did the Mazda MX-5 Cup cars and that partnership has been there for a while,” says Doak.

“I believe it’s a similar process. Teams can buy directly from Mazda North America.

“We bought a couple of those [MX-5 Cup cars] and brought them here, but we never used them. It was just for demonstration runs and we showed a few people who were interested. We’ve sold them on now.”

Technical details for the TCR Mazda3 are similar to all the other cars in the category, with a modified engine producing 260kW, a six-speed sequential gearbox with shift paddles and competition suspension and brakes.

Although the $US175,000 price looks costly in American dollars, it is in line with the TCR cost cap that means cars must be produced for the equivalent of $250,000 Australian.

While there is no news yet for a Mazda3 entry in the TCR Australia Series next year, another new brand could join the championship as early as the final round of the 2019 series at The Bend next month.

A Seat Cupra has just landed in Australia and provided it makes the grid under new owners Garage1 from Melbourne, jointly run by motorsport veterans Marty Brant and John Evans, it will lift the number of brands in the inaugural championship to 10 and push the grid another step closer to the category’s objective of 20 cars.