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BUCHAN TO TAKE ADVANTAGE OF WORLD TOUR EXPERIENCE
Josh Buchan is looking forward to taking advantage of the ‘learning opportunity’ that comes with Kumho TCR World Tour’s visit down under in November.
The Hyundai HMO Customer Racing driver is currently in the midst of a thrilling Supercheap Auto TCR Australia series title battle with teammate Bailey Sweeny, but it won’t be his only focus when he takes to the track alongside some of the best in the world at Race Sydney next weekend.
Competing in the Hyundai factory team, Buchan will have a rare opportunity to get up close and personal with one of the most successful teams in the World Tour field this year and learn the ins and outs of what makes them so fast on track.
Hyundai will field a further two cars at both Race Sydney and Supercheap Auto Bathurst International, with Spain’s Mikel Azcona and Hungary’s Norbert Michelisz to race under the South Korean manufacturer’s flag.
Both drivers have seen great success so far in 2023, with Michelisz leading the standings with two race wins to his name while Azcona sits in fourth with a single win coming in the most recent round in South America.
Ahead of Race Sydney, Buchan looked forward to studying the cars and using the round for ‘research and development’ purposes.
“It’s great for the category, the last time a world series event was hosted in this country for TCR was a long time ago, so it is super exciting,” Buchan said.
“We get to test ourselves against not only the best drivers but the best teams who spend millions a year to run these cars.
“I want to see what they do, how they operate, simple things like that are very interesting to me. What do they do differently to get more speed out of the car? Are we getting as much out of it as they are? It’s stuff I am very curious to see.
“It will be interesting to see how different they are and if they have different ideas to us on how to achieve speed. From a selfish driver’s point of view, it’s basically research and development when they come over here.
“From a spectator’s point of view, it’s going to be awesome to see the local Aussies take on the rest of the world, I think we will see a lot of patriotism towards us for sure.
“But it’s certainly a factor, every team has their process and even something as simple as tyre phasing, it can be very car-specific.
“We think we have a good handle on it but if they come out and do it differently and it works, we want to know why it did and they did.
“Sydney is great because I don’t think they will have some magic sauce to be two seconds a lap quicker, if they are faster then we need to know why.
“There are so many things that we look at and we can go, ‘that’s something we can adapt’.”
Kumho TCR World Tour will feature alongside Supercheap Auto TCR Australia Series at Race Sydney on 3-4 November, before returning the following week for Supercheap Auto Bathurst International on 10-12 November.
Want to know more about Kumho TCR World Tour’s visit down under? View the fast facts here.
