News

September 13, 2021 | General

HMO Customer Racing’s 2022 planning underway

Leading Supercheap Auto TCR Australia team HMO Customer Racing will continue to enter the Hyundai i30 N TCR as it begins to plan for next year’s campaign.

Currently, the Korean manufacturer has three homologated TCR models; the Elantra N TCR, which debuted at the beginning of this year in WTCR and TCR Europe, the predominately US-based Veloster N TCR and i30 N TCR.

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HMO Customer Racing’s Nathan Morcom ruled out transferring across to the newer Elantra N TCR in 2022. He highlighted the local market, the unknowns surrounding a new model and the continued race winning form of the i30 N TCR, which has not only won in Australia, but recently in Italy and the UK.

“We will keep the i30 N TCRs because of the Australian market and also we’ve got the cars here in Australia,” said Morcom.

“The i30 N TCR is still winning races so you can’t complain about it. They’re more than capable to be competitive and win races, but the best thing they’ve got apart from the pace is the reliability day-in day-out.”

Following on from its series winning campaign in 2019, Josh Buchan leads the HMO Customer Racing charge in third after two wins at Sydney Motorsport Park and is just one spot ahead of Morcom, who admitted work needed to be completed after the opening rounds of the season.

“We definitely didn’t start off on the best foot at the beginning of the year, but ever since then we’ve tracked on and discovered what we needed to find in speed,” he explained.

“With Josh coming on, he’s definitely hit the ground running being third in the series you can’t complain with that.”

A key achievement for the team this year is not only an expansion to three entries, but also through customer programs with privateer squads Tilton Racing and Dash Sport, with Hyundai being the first to have five representatives on the Supercheap Auto TCR Australia grid at SMP.

“We always wanted to grow and three cars we can do really easy, really well and professionally still,” Morcom said.

“It was really good to grow for Hyundai Australia and HMO Customer Racing.”

Being one of the first organisations to commit to Supercheap Auto TCR Australia, Morcom holds a unique perspective on the development of the class.

“It’s come a long way since the first year in 2019, definitely in growth of media exposure, the depth of the category and the drivers coming into this year, everyone has stepped up the game professionally,” he summarised.

“The level of competition is really tough, which is good and what everyone wants to see.

“The competition is there and the door-to-door racing is consistent every time we hit the track.”