Audi RS 3 LMS (TCR)Battle for the lead of the standings: Audi privateer Nicola Baldan had to show nerves of steel on the fourth race weekend of the TCR Italy. He had traveled to Imola with a three-point lead and started the first race from seventh on the grid in his Audi RS 3 LMS. After the Italian crossed the finish line in the same position, the championship lead had passed to Honda driver Ruben Volt with a two-point advantage. In the subsequent sprint, Baldan stormed into the lead from second on the grid and celebrated his second win of the season after 16 laps. This puts him eight points ahead of Volt with two race weekends remaining. In the TCR Italy DSG for racing cars with dual-clutch transmissions, which also took place in Imola, victory in the first race went to Luca Franca from Aikoa Racing. It was his first win of the season. Third place went to Luca Verdi from Planet Motorsport. Both drove a first-generation Audi RS 3 LMS. Verdi was the best Audi driver in the second race in second place. Franca leads the standings with a 31-point advantage. In the TCR Eastern Europe, the Czech Martin Kadlečik in the Audi RS 3 LMS from Aditis Racing finished second in each of the two races in Brno. In the Super Taikyu Series, Audi Team Show Apex secured its first win of the season on the fourth race weekend in Motegi. Yoshinari Fujiwara/Shigetomo Shimono/Shozo Tagahara had started the five-hour race in third place in the TCR class. While their two Honda rivals struggled in the heat of the race, the Audi driver trio took the lead and built up a two-lap advantage by the finish. In the TCR China Challenge, Pan Yiming won the first sprint for Nkoda HW Racing on the fifth race weekend. Third place went to TPR Racing with Li Kahei in another Audi RS 3 LMS. In the second sprint in Ningbo, Li Kahei took second place ahead of Liu Zichen in an Audi from the 326 Racing Team.Audi R8 LMS GT4Top performance in Japan: Team Techno First had its strongest weekend of the season so far at the fourth round of the Super Taikyu Series in Japan. Masaki Kanou/Ryoma Henzan/Hironobu Yasuda/Riki Okusa in the Audi R8 LMS GT4 defied the heat on the Motegi circuit. The team had planned equal race distances for each of the four drivers in the five-hour race and paid close attention to fuel consumption. The strategy proved to be very balanced, resulting in second place out of eleven participants in the ST-Z category. The Audi R8 LMS GT4 also achieved a podium finish in China. At the third round of the GT Sprint Challenge in Ningbo, Harmony Racing with the driver pairing of Bao Junbin/Tenn Wu was the third-best GT4 team in the first race.Coming up next week13–14/09 Teretonga (NZ), round 1, South Island Endurance Championship13–15/09 Dijon (F), round 5, GT4 France13–15/09 Dijon (F), round 5, TC France13–15/09 Red Bull Ring (A), round 6, International GT Open13–15/09 Barcelona (E), round 5, 24H Series powered by Hankook13–15/09 Buriram (THA), round 4, TCR Asia14/09 Snetterton (GB), round 6, British Endurance Championship14–15/09 Shanghai (CHN), round 6, GT World Challenge Asia14–15/09 Vallelunga (I), round 4, Coppa Italia Turismo

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