With the UEFA European Football Final taking place this Sunday there is not much space for Motorsport this weekend. Of the categories we follow only the FIA World Touring Car Cup is racing with the Race of Spain occurring in Alcañiz, Aragón.
WTCR Race of Spain
The FIA World Touring Car Cup travels to Spain for round number three of the season at the circuit of MotorLand Aragón in the town of Alcañiz, Spain.
The track made its debut in the series last year and has already proved a success within the fans and the drivers thanks to six packed races. The track, in fact, was used for two events in 2020, the Race of Spain and the Race of Aragón, which was also the final event of the year.
The first two rounds of 2021 (Germany and Portugal) have seen a substantial equilibrium at least between Hyundai, Honda and Lynk & Co.
Hyundai with its driver Jean-Karl Vernay leads the drivers standings, despite a difficult weekend in Estoril. Race 1 was in fact a complete disaster for the Korean manufacturer with only Luca Engstler able to finish and down in 12th place. The other three drivers were all involved in a multi-car accident at turn one after the start and were all forced to retire. Race 2 though went much better for the manufacturer with all three drivers finishing in positions 2-3-4.
Vernay has a 5-point margin over Honda’s Attila Tassi and Lynk & Co’s duo Yvan Muller and Santiago Urrutia.
Despite the win in the main race, for Honda Portugal it was more a case of what could have been. After a fantastic qualifying session which ended with four Hondas in the top 5, there was high expectation for the main race. Instead three of the Honda drivers were left unable to fight for the win: first it happened to Girolami, who had to start from the back of the grid, having made repairs from a race 1 incident, then Guerrieri stalled from pole at the start and finally Monteiro retired with technical issues while in a comfortable lead. Only the young Tassi could save the Japanese manufacturer’s weekend, taking also his first career win in WTCR.
But the bad news for Honda are not over, as compensation weights based on the performance of the cars and not on race results are introduced from this round.
In the first two rounds the Honda Civic was the fastest model in WTCR and for that reason in Spain it will run 70 kg (considering both BoP and compensation weight) heavier than at the previous rounds.
Despite not taking full benefit from the performance advantage in Estoril, Monteiro and Guerrieri, the latter recovering to eight after his false start in the main race, are both fifth in the standings, 9 points from the lead, while Girolami is down in eighth, 19 points adrift.
Hyundai will also have to add weight: 50 kg more compared to the previous rounds. Apart from Vernay, the start of the season has been quite complicated for the other drivers, as the team probably need time to learn the new car. Engstler and Michelisz are in fact tied in ninth place already 33 points behind their teammate. Tarquini is a further 5 points behind in twelfth place. With so much competition amongst different manufacturers, Hyundai could already start to think about team orders with Vernay appearing as the clear team leader at the moment.
With Honda and Hyundai becoming heavier, the third manufacturer could take advantage. Lynk & Co will in fact add only 10 kg of compensation weight for the next round while the BoP has remained unchanged.
For the Chinese manufacturer a good news after the start of the season saw the car behind in performance compared to Hyundai and Honda. All podiums and the only win of the season (actually a 1-2-3 in Estoril with Ehrlacher in front) were taken in the reversed grid races, while the drivers were struggling in qualifying and in the main races.
The team was left unhappy with the BoP at the start of the season, calling for its adjustment prior to the Portuguese round. The decision from Geely (the Holding Group which owns Lynk & Co) of withdrawing support for the home race in Ningbo has to be read as a result of that dispute with the series.
Alongside Muller and Urrutia – the latter took his first WTCR win at Aragón last year – the team can count also on 2020 Champion Yann Ehrlacher, seventh in the standings 12 points off the lead, while Thed Björk needs a very good weekend if he wants to improve his position in the standings (13th with a gap of 39 points from the leader).
Regarding the other models in the series, the second round of the season didn’t show any improvements for Audi. All Comtoyou drivers will benefit from a reduction in weight of 30 kg and they will hope for a performance improvement. Best driver in the standings is Nathanael Berthon, eleventh but already 37 points from Vernay.
CUPRA has instead already shown some progress after a miserable opening weekend in Germany, with both Rob Huff and Mikel Azcona able to hit the top 10 in Portugal. The English driver is also the best placed driver in the standings.
More improvements are anticipated for this weekend as the CUPRA will lose 20 kg from success ballast.
Race of Spain is also the home ground for the manufacturer and for two of its drivers, Jordi Gené and Mikel Azcona, with the latter having taken his first WTCR win at Aragón in one of the races from last year.
Racing in this time of the year in Spain is always connected to sun and hot weather, something we were missing in the first two rounds of the season. This is one of the areas of most concern for drivers and teams, as it can affect tire wear.
The WTCR event will be supported by the PURE ETCR, the touring car series for electric cars, which will run on a different layout of the track but on the same program. This means that Azcona, Genè and Vernay will be on double duty this weekend, as all three drivers are entered in both series.
The two Spanish drivers will race the Cupra e-Racer alongside Mattias Ekström and Dániel Nagy, Vernay will be at the wheel of the Hyundai Veloster N ETCR together with Augusto Farfus, Tom Chilton and John Filippi, while the Alfa Romeo Giulia will be driven by Stefano Coletti, Luca Filippi, Rodrigo Baptista and Oliver Webb.
Timetable Race of Spain
All times in CET
Friday July 9th
9:00-9:30 Pure ETRC – Free Practice
11:30-12:00 Pure ETRC – Free Practice
14:35-14:57 Pure ETRC – Pool A Round 1
17:35-17:57 Pure ETRC – Pool B Round 1
Saturday July 10th
09:45-10:25 WTCR – Free Practice 1
11:20-11:57 Pure ETCR – Pool A – Round 2
12:45-13:25 WTCR – Free Practice 2
14:50-15:27 Pure ETCR – Pool B Round 2
16:30-17:10 WTCR – Qualifying
18:00-18:30 Pure ETCR – Pool A Round 3 Time Trial
19:30-20:00 Pure ETCR – Pool B Round 3 Time Trial
Sunday July 11th
9:45-10:00 Pure ETRC – Round 4 DHL Super Final A (7 laps)
11:15-11:45 Race 1 (10 laps)
13:15-13:50 Race 2 (12 laps)
16:0-16:20 Pure ETRC – Round 4 DHL Super Final B (7 laps)
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