Typically, a brand new racing car needs some time to iron out any teething issues before it is capable of challenging for the checkered flag. Audi begs to differ.

The German automaker has been dominated endurance sports car racing for years now, and evidently poured the wealth of its experience into the new RS3 LMS.

The customer racing version of Ingolstadt’s new compact performance sedan entered its first race this past weekend in the TCR category of the final VLN series race of the season at the Nürburgring.

At the end of the grueling race around the Nordschleife, the RS3 piloted by Jordi Gené and Kelvin van der Linde finished in 17th place, while the second car shared by Rahel Frey and Christopher Haase came in 22. That’s pretty impressive when you consider that 140 vehicles started the race, and that the RS3 LMS beat everything else in its class straight out of the box.

The overall winners were Christopher Mies and Connor de Phillippi in an R8 LMS. So all in all, it was a pretty good day for Audi and its customer racing teams.

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