Hard task - Race of UK Free Practice 1

2010. július 17. 12:03 | még nem szólt hozzá senki.  szerző: Viktor Adorján

The 2010 WTCC Race of UK has finally kicked off with Free Practice 1 on Saturday morning in Brands Hatch. The 30 minutes long session was disrupted by two red flags that divided the tracktime into two parts. Norbert Michelisz ended the session down to 17th on the timesheet.

Unlike the most of the WTCC events the schedule of the Race of UK didn't contain the initial 30 minutes long testing session on Friday which meant that the first time that the drivers were able to get into their car and hit the track is Free Practice 1 on Saturday morning.

Yesterday was quite strange for Norbert Michelisz who only put on his racing overall for a photoshoot because simply there wasn't any sessions that he could have been able to participate. While his former series, the SEAT Leon EuroCup spent one and a half hours on the track, Michelisz was left with a radio headset in the pitlane and acted as a spotter for Duarte Félix da Costa.

Michelisz admitted that he was bored on Friday before leaving for the regular track inspection on Friday evening, a day later than they usually do this task but the delay didn't cause any concern, he and his engineer Arnau Niubó Bosch could do this thanks to the extra day that appeared in the schedule.

The Hungarian driver and his engineer were joined by SEAT Leon EuroCup championship leader Gábor Wéber, the trio of team personnel discussed the changes on the circuit since they last visited it before the opening Free Practice for the WTCC took place.

Only on P17

Almost perfect weather conditions were present for the first free practice at 9 AM when the drivers hit the track but it was obvious that the traffic will be something to watch out for the entire weekend onwards. The circuit is so tight and long corners with medium speed makes overtaking quite difficult here but it is all part of the game in Brands Hatch.

It is very difficult to find anybody who is not enthusiastic about the circuit and the location but all the positive approach can be overshadowed by a result which is not up to the expectations. Zengő-Dension Team's Norbert Michelisz kicked off the weekend with a 17th place on Free Practice 1 which is not an unusual place to be for the Hungarian driver but this time the result caused a little bit of a displeasure in the garage.

Michelisz said that he was pushing the car really hard already and admitted that he is searching for the areas where he can extract more out of the car but he had no initial idea of what is causing his car to be only in the midfield.

On the top of that only one SEAT Leon TDI is behind Michelisz, it was driven by Michel Nykjaer until the Dane crashed heavily into the tyre wall while he tried to turn into the start/finish straight. Nykjaer's car was damaged badly and the incident brought out the first red flag session of the day.

Chevrolet and BMW are ahead

At that time three times world champion Andy Priaulx lead the field with his 1:33.808 but his time was later improved by Robert Huff who did a 1:33.761 and topped the timesheet. Augusto Farfus joined the leaders with a 1:33.902 and finished third in the order.

The fastest SEAT Leon TDI was driven by reigning world champion Gabriele Tarquini on P4 before the Italian driver fell into the gravel trap with a few minutes to go from the session. The car didn't get damaged but it was placed on a dangerous position that is why the red flag was needed again and the practice didn't get restarted.

When the accident happened Norbert Michelisz happened to be in the pits waiting for his mechanics to finalize the adjustments that they planned during the session but had to get out of the car as the session was cancelled.

This means that only 30 more minutes are available for Norbert Michelisz and his engineer to find out what to do with the car in order to get into the Q2 again which seems to be a hard task. 10th placed Tiago Monteiro was around 0.8 second faster than Michelisz with an identical racecar,

It should be noted that Yvan Muller and Alain Menu both driving for Chevrolet managed the same amount of laptimes on P5 and P6 but more importantly they did the same laptime as well.

They were followed by Colin Turkington who is a real black horse for the weekend as his BMW is quite competitive thanks to the situation of the success ballasts. Volvo's Robert Dahlgren ended up 9th with his C30 which will be present here and in Okayama later this year.

Free Practice 2 will start at 1 PM local time and will be followed by Race 1 of the SEAT Leon EuroCup and Qualifying for the WTCC. Busy afternoon is ahead of the Zengő-Dension Team.

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