TCR UK Touring Car Championship – Rounds 16 & 17
Brands Hatch Indy Finale – 1st & 2nd November 2025
Adam Shepherd was crowned 2025 TCR UK Touring Car champion with a consummate display in an entertaining finale at Brands Hatch.
Shepherd won the opening race of the weekend at the former British Grand Prix venue to put himself within touching distance of the title, then sealed the deal with a controlled drive a day later.
Championship runner-up Callum Newsham ended his season on a high with victory in the final race. Also celebrating were Gen 1 Cup champion Jeff Alden and Goodyear Diamond Award winner Mark Smith. Area Motorsport clinched this year’s Teams Championship.
Qualifying
Points leader Adam Shepherd gave himself the best possible chance of clinching the title by putting his Capture Motorsport-run CUPRA Leon VZ on pole position, clinching maximum qualifying points for the sixth time in seven weekends.
In sunny, dry conditions, Shepherd was 0.205 seconds faster than title rival Callum Newsham in his Hyundai Elantra N. Newsham’s JH Racing crew and backers had worked wonders to get the Elantra back in shape following his accident at Snetterton. He rewarded them with a quick time that got within 0.04s of Shepherd’s best at the time, only for Shepherd to immediately go faster still.
Making his second appearance in the Lynk & Co 03 run by Ben Sharpe Racing, Max Hall was third fastest, 0.15s down on Newsham’s best. He would start alongside Sam Laidlaw (Area Motorsport CUPRA Leon VZ), who retained an outside chance of the title should Shepherd and Newsham slip up.
George Jaxon continued his strong run of form to put his Vannin Motorsport CUPRA Leon VZ fifth, just ahead of Brad Hutchison’s older Leon Competicion run by family outfit Bond It with MPH Racing.
Will Beech (Capture Motorsport Leon Competicion) was the quickest Goodyear Diamond Award driver (those aged 40 and over) in seventh overall. Luke Sargeant (Vannin Motorsport Audi RS3 LMS) was less than 0.1s slower than Beech in eighth, while Sargeant’s Vannin team-mates Harry Bloor (Leon Competicion) and Jordan Kerridge (Audi) completed the top 10.
Returnee Rick Kerry (JH Racing) qualified 11th in the ex-Callum Newsham Hyundai i30 N, just ahead of the leading Gen 1 Cup runner. That was another driver returning to the championship, Darelle Wilson aboard his long-serving Vauxhall Astra, now backed by Trade Nation.
Sixteen-year-old debutant Jenson O’Neill-Going was battling overheating issues aboard the Jamsport-run Subaru WRX STi as he qualified 13th, ahead of Capture duo Greg Saunders and Mark Smith.
Gen 1 entrants Alex Jones (DW Racing Volkswagen Golf), returnee Cedric Bloch (Simon Green Motorsport Audi) and Jeff Alden (Matrix Motorsport with Power Maxed Racing Opel Astra) completed an 18-car field.
BRANDS HATCH FINALE QUALIFYING RESULT
Round Sixteen – Race Report
Shepherd put one hand on the championship silverware as he closed to within three points of clinching the crown with victory in Saturday afternoon’s first race.
The Capture Motorsport driver converted pole position into the race lead, with Newsham slotting into second. Shepherd had set his car up to be strong later in the race, which offered Newsham the opportunity to challenge early on. He did just that but was unable to find a way past.
A slow getaway from Hall dropped him to sixth behind Laidlaw, Hutchison and Jaxon, before a safety car period neutralised the race after Bloor spun into the Paddock Hill gravel.
Shepherd looked to have made a perfect restart, only for waved yellow flags to immediately reappear as O’Neill-Going was in strife. Electrical problems had filled the Subaru’s cabin with smoke and O’Neill-Going was forced to bail out.
The race was stopped and restarted behind the safety car over a 10-minute duration. Once again, Shepherd got his restart spot on and had a lead of more than a second when they crossed the line. Newsham responded with a series of fastest laps but he was never able to get closer than 0.95s behind before Shepherd increased the margin once more.
The 5G Communications-backed CUPRA crossed the line 1.75s clear of Newsham’s Hyundai as Shepherd took his eighth win of the season. Newsham’s fastest lap helped him keep the title alive for another day, but his hopes were now clinging by a thread.
Behind the lead pair, Laidlaw pulled away from a ferocious battle behind him to clinch third position, 4s shy of Newsham. Hutchison had his mirrors full of Jaxon’s CUPRA for most of the race but just held off the Londoner’s challenge by 0.127s at the flag.
Hall had also been involved in the battle before pitting with a puncture, which also blew a hole in his Lynk & Co’s radiator, putting him out of the race.
So Sargeant inherited sixth ahead of Beech, who took Goodyear Diamond Award honours and nibbled into Mark Smith’s lead in the points. Behind Kerry in eighth, Smith himself was ninth overall, just 0.133s ahead of Saunders who completed the top 10.
Non-scoring guest Darelle Wilson took Gen 1 Cup laurels, although it was Cedric Bloch who earned maximum points in the class. Jeff Alden was hampered by recurrent boost problems due to an actuator problem but dragged his recalcitrant Opel home to seal the Gen 1 Cup championship title with one race remaining.
BRANDS HATCH FINALE ROUND SIXTEEN RESULT
Round Seventeen – Race Report
With the top 10 from Saturday’s race reversed to form the grid for Sunday’s season finale, it was Greg Saunders who started on pole position with Mark Smith alongside.
Adam Shepherd toyed with the idea of starting from the pitlane in order to avoid any potential first-lap dramas but decided to take up his position on row five alongside Callum Newsham.
Knowing he had to win the race to have any chance of denying Shepherd the title, Newsham made a blistering start. He powered between the cars in front to jump from ninth to third by the second corner. When leader Saunders ran wide at Graham Hill Bend, Laidlaw – who himself had started eighth – shot past to take the lead and Newsham snatched second.
Newsham then dived past Laidlaw at Clearways to complete a remarkable first lap where he climbed from ninth to first in little more than a mile.
Further back, Shepherd was being understandably circumspect through the busy first few corners and lay seventh, behind Saunders, Smith, Jaxon and Hutchison. Just behind Shepherd, from the back of the grid, was a charging Max Hall.
As Smith was shuffled back further, he was tapped into a spin at the Druids hairpin by Hall. Smith was lucky not to be collected and, with the incident happening just in front of Shepherd, the championship leader again opted for a cautious approach, slotting in behind Hall.
As the front two pulled clear, Jaxon snatched third from Saunders at Graham Hill Bend just before a safety car neutralised the race with Darelle Wilson off at Surtees.
Newsham made a good restart and fired in a series of quick laps en route to a largely untroubled victory. It was his fourth of the season and the very first win in this country for the Hyundai Elantra, a fine reward for everyone who had worked so hard to get the car back on track for the final weekend of the season.
Laidlaw was equally untroubled in second as he clinched third in the championship standings in his first full season, while Jaxon drove another strong race to finish third.
It was behind the lead trio where the nail-biting action was happening. Shepherd was desperate to keep out of trouble but found himself getting involved in a fierce scrap between Hutchison and Hall for fourth after all three quickly dispatched Saunders.
Mid-race, Hutchison and Hall were running side-by-side for multiple corners at a time as Hall had trouble making a move stick. It was costing both drivers time and eventually Shepherd got a run on Hall to take fourth from the teenager.
However, that made the situation even trickier for Shepherd who was now caught in a sandwich between the pair. Believing he had the pace to escape if he could only find a way past, Shepherd went on the attack, but Hutchison’s defence repeatedly held firm. Eventually, Shepherd decided that discretion was the better part of valour and yielded to Hall with the youngster then completing his pass of Hutchison at Druids on what became the last lap.
In the lower half of the top 10, a gearbox issue meant Will Beech was slow away at the safety car restart. But he then enjoyed a race-long scrap with Luke Sargeant for seventh, with the pair bearing down on the battling trio in front.
Unfortunately, when Jeff Alden’s engine blew it left oil at Paddock Hill Bend and both Beech and Sargeant skated off into the gravel, joining Alex Jones who had just done the same. Red flags flew and, with the race past 75% distance, it was declared.
So, behind podium finishers Newsham, Laidlaw and Jaxon, fourth went to Hall, with Hutchison fifth. Sixth was more than enough to clinch the TCR UK title for Shepherd, the culmination of four years’ work.
Ricky Kerry inherited seventh, a good finish to his first weekend in the Hyundai, ahead of Saunders, Harry Bloor and Jordan Kerridge. With Beech not classified, 11th-placed Smith topped the Goodyear Diamond Award order and sealed the season-long title in the process.
Best of the Gen 1 Cup runners was non-scoring guest Jenson O’Neill-Going, 12th overall. The youngster was delighted to have brought the slightly temperamental Subaru home safely and earned a trophy in the process.
BRANDS HATCH FINALE ROUND SEVENTEEN RESULT
Driver Quotes
Round 16 winner and 2025 TCR UK champion Adam Shepherd
“We’ve been struggling all weekend with the car – oversteer, understeer, oversteer, understeer. But it was fast. It was hard to gauge how good my start was because I think Max got a bad one. But I had a big lead into Turn 1, Turn 2, and then brought it home.”
Round 17 winner and 2025 TCR UK runner-up Callum Newsham
“That’s the best we could have done, win that race and get fastest lap. Well done to Adam, he’s done a mega race and mega year. But we ended on a high, didn’t we? So I’ll take it.”
Championship positions after Brands Hatch Indy Finale
Next time – Brands Hatch Indy – The 2026 Season Opener!
The TCR UK Touring Car Championship is back in action on the 4th & 5th of April, 2026, with the new season getting underway at Brands Hatch in Kent, using the Indy layout.
To learn more about the TCR UK Touring Car Championship, visit https://www.tcr-uk.co.uk/ for more information and how to get involved.
For more information about the 2026 TCR UK Touring Car Championship, visit https://www.tcr-uk.co.uk/2026-calendar/
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