This article is provided by Axle Motorsport.
Fresh off dominating his return to Touring Car Racing with the recently concluded TCR Malaysia series at Sepang, Mitchell Cheah looks ahead to the coming season where he will be the first ever Malaysian to race in TCR Germany, arguably the toughest Touring Car series in the world.
Over the preceding weekend at the Sepang International Circuit, Mitchell raced the last round of TCR Malaysia as preparation for his coming season. He had not been in a touring car since October last year and so it was a surprise when he dominated the weekend in his VW Golf GTI. He took pole position and a Race 1 win over Hyundai works driver and TCR Malaysia Champion, Luca Engstler. He also set a new lap record for TCR cars around Sepang in the process. He then followed up the win with a second place finish for Race 2 despite starting 8th in the reverse grid race.
Mitchell will now focus on his preparation for TCR Germany, which starts in April of this year. While he was only doing national level touring cars in 2017, he was TCR South East Asia champion in 2018 due to being sponsored by Sepang International Circuit after winning the TCR Asia Shoot out in January of that year.
“I have done quite a lot of simulator work at home with all the tracks so at least I can get an idea of the different kind of circuits in Europe. We will also travel to Germany in a couple of weeks in the hope of doing some preseason testing, weather permitting.” said Mitchell after the weekend.
“Mitchell is proving that he deserves his chance on the International scene with all the results he has been consistently getting over the last year. You could arguably say he is South East Asia’s best touring car driver right now. His first year in Europe will be a learning year and there will be challenges, but I’m confident he has the talent to succeed,” said his Race Mentor, Alex Yoong of Axle Motorsport.
Mitchell’s experience in Europe this year will especially help him in his preparation for the final WTCR race of the year, which will be held in Sepang, where he has been granted the wild card entry. From local touring car races to the world stage in just over a year, Mitchell is clearly showing he is a man in a hurry.
His next race for TCR Germany will be in Oschersleben, Germany from the 26th to the 28th of April.
Additional notes: Mitchell also finished 8th representing Team Malaysia under the management of Axle Motorsport at the inaugural FIA Nations Cup last December in Bahrain.
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