TCR World Tour – Macau

Aussie duo Josh Buchan and Ryan MacMillan concluded the TCR World Tour campaign with good showings in Macau, topped by Buchan grabbing the race win in the final session of the year.

Buchan notched up the ninth-quickest time in Qualifying 1 with a best lap of 2:30.396, meanwhile MacMillan would start at the back of the grid for Race 1.

Qualifying 2 would yield interesting results, with Buchan just squeezing into the top 10 by five one-thousandths of a second and would then start ninth on the grid following a post-qualification penalty to a competitor.

Both drivers made net gains in the first of two races, with Buchan finishing the session in seventh and MacMillan in 13th.

A happier affair in Race 2, Buchan would claim his second win of the season and became the first Australian driver to win the Macau Guia Race in its 63-year history after a defensive masterclass.

Buchan started on pole from a reverse grid order start, and faced an onslaught of lunges from Santiago Urrutia and later Ma Qing Hua over the duration of the session.

Buchan continued to defend for the final three laps against Ma, eventually crossing the line less than half a second ahead of the Chinese driver.

Buchan’s HMO Customer Racing teammate Ryan MacMillan started the second race from 16th and finished ninth.

“I don’t think I had a single moment to breathe from start to finish. Defending from Santi was relentless, and then as soon as he made his mistake, Ma was doing exactly the same,” Buchan said post-win.

“I’ve been struggling in Sector 1 all weekend. Strangely, some of the high-speed stuff between the walls, wasn’t an issue, but that first sector, it just didn’t click.

“Once I was in front, I knew it would be very difficult for them to pass, because the car was good down the straight, but I also wasn’t going to let it go without a proper fight.

“It was an excellent race from everyone, across the whole grid.”

Buchan finished the campaign in 11th with 154 Championship points, meanwhile other Aussies to feature in the standings included Will Brown (62 points), MacMillan (53 points), Cody Burcher (10 points), Zac Soutar (six points), Brad Harris (two points) and Jordan Cox (two points).

Baja 1000 – Mexico

After a sublime start at the world-famous Baja 1000, Toby Price’s fairytale finish in Mexico was not to be.

Price, accompanied by navigator Brent Bauman and co-driver Paul Weel led the event, but with just 51 miles remaining in the event, the Team Australia Red Bull Trophy Truck was brought to an unfortunate halt after running out of fuel.

Price and the team began from third position after a solid qualifying effort and eventually led the race into the night.

The #46 Red Bull/BFGoodrich Mason Motorsports all-wheel drive was part of the leading pack the entire race, before running out of fuel at race mile 803, caused by an accidental short fill at a pit stop.

Price and Weel would finish the race in 15th outright and seventh among the Trophy Trucks.

“It’s just one of them tough ones, it’s hard to swallow,” Price said.

“We’re all human, we made a big mistake. It’s just frustrating, we had a really good day, Paul did an amazing job keeping the truck in position and for us, we were just trying to manage the truck as we knew the rain was coming.

“It was panning out as exactly as we wanted, we got around Menzies, we were in first physically on track and on time, and the fun only lasted another 25 miles.

“We just fell short on some fuel, so it’s a tough one to take.”

The #46 team would finish the Baja 1000 with an overall time of 18:22:31.983.