Robert Wickens became IMSA TCR champion

This weekend an event took place, perhaps not very striking from a sporting point of view, but very important in many other respects: Robert Wickens became champion of the American IMSA Michelin Piliot Challenge series in the TCR class.

This happened more than five years after he was involved in a serious accident at the Pocono oval circuit while racing in IndyCar for Schmidt Peterson Motorsports (now Arrow McLaren), which left him with a spinal cord injury and a long stay in a hospital bed.

But after showing tremendous will, he gradually withdrew, and although the mobility of his lower limbs was never restored, Robert returned last year to the wheel of a racing car equipped with a special manual control. Already in the summer of 2022 he achieved his first victory after returning to service, which we were happy to talk about at the time.

Driving Brian Herta’s Hyundai Elantra N TCR with teammate Harry Gottsacker, the 34-year-old Canadian finished fourth in yesterday’s season finale at Road Atlanta – a result good enough to win the class championship. At the same time, team No. 33 did not achieve a single victory all season, but in 11 stages Robert and Harry reached the podium 8 times.

“It happened. We became champions in 2023! – Robert commented on social networks. “It is difficult to put into words how much this means to me, so I will probably talk about everything in more detail on a day when we all celebrate.” From the bottom of my heart I would like to thank Brian Herta, my partner, our entire team and everyone at Hyundai for making this achievement possible!”