NASCAR Euro Series – The Comeback Charge: How Sandro Tavartkiladze Turned His Fortunes Around in the Master Trophy
You never say it’s over until it’s truly over. For Sandro Tavartkiladze, this old adage holds true as he waited until the last lap of the 2026 OPEN season to secure his crown in the Master Trophy classification. The Georgian conquered the poor luck that plagued him in the early parts of the campaign and beat his seven rivals after a titanic battle at the tarmacs of Circuit Zolder in Belgium to bring home the class title that he has been waiting for since his electric debut to the NASCAR Euro Series in 2025.
Tavartkiladze started the 2026 season with renewed motivation. After finishing just shy of the Master Trophy title in his debut season in 2025, where he finished fourth overall, he seeks to complete the story with his high-profile move to the powerhouse Dutch outfit Team Bleekemolen during the winter. The momentum is in the Tbilisi native’s hands, but his first lap of the year went horribly wrong: Tavartkiladze was collected in an opening lap multi-car incident on the first race in Spain, putting him in the back for the second race at the Circuit Ricardo Tormo in Valencia.
The Georgian pulled off a strong comeback to claim his first Master Trophy win in eighth position, but the bad luck continued in France. Two poor results cost Tavartkiladze more ground to Maxim van Laere, who took the early initiative with three top-10 finishes at Valencia and Le Castellet. Tavartkiladze stood on the sidelines, pondering when he would get the opportunity to turn his fortunes around.
The chance would finally come in the third round at the UK, the home of the spectacular crown jewel American SpeedFest event. Minor misfortunes still affected Tavartkiladze, but the Georgian secured the Master Trophy sweep that he had been looking for since the first green light of the season. From there, the pace of Tavartkiladze and the talented mechanics that worked on his #72 Team Bleekemolen Toyota Camry were practically unstoppable. More sweeps in Czechia and Italy avenged his early season demons and the 27-year old finds himself as the Master Trophy overall leader entering the Finals in Belgium.
Two deciding double points paying races and one titanic duel against seven of his chasers. That’s the stakes that Tavartkiladze had in his hands at Circuit Zolder. All he needed was to manage the situation well and he did just that: An eight class win in OPEN Final 2 was enough to cancel out the losses that he had to tank in OPEN Final 1. At the end of the weekend, the Georgian stood tall as the new king of the aspiring talents with a 19 point lead to Florian Richard, who claimed the class runner-up after he won at his home race at Circuit Paul Ricard.
The battle for third overall went down to the wire: Dominique Schaak narrowly beat Jens Beeusaert by two points, but the Belgian favorite did not go down without a fight. Beeusaert demonstrated his rapid adaptability with a Master Trophy win in his first OPEN rain race at Final 1 and earlier in the season had also taken his first class win in just his second ever race at France. Late season struggles by van Laere left him fifth overall with Ossi Pohjanharju, Henri Timonen, Valentino Gambarotto, Davide Frulio, Maximilian Seth, Mike Wise and Marc-Antoine D’Amour rounding out the final classifications.
The 2026 Master Trophy crown is Sandro Tavartkiladze’s to keep. It took him a long, uphill battle to get up to the title, but it’s clear that the journey will not stop at that point for the Georgian. Tavartkiladze is aiming for more: He’s eyeing for race wins and the overall championship in the division that will be known as V8Open in 2027. With the full support of Georgia’s public, the future is looking bright for the 27-year old in the world of European NASCAR.
