SEAT vs. SEAT: The tools for Michelisz to race

2010. március 1. 01:51  szerző: Viktor Adorján

This season Zengő Dension Team and Norbert Michelisz take the final step and will compete with SEAT’s most advanced racing technology to date, the 2009 world champion Leon TDI in the FIA WTCC.

From now on this will be Michelisz’s regular racecar but it will take a while until we forget – if ever – the range of different SEAT Leons that served the Hungarian driver during his journey to the top level of the world.

Norbert Michelisz raced four different types of SEAT Leon racecars last year, all of them looked pretty similar, a few of them was almost identical to each other but every single version was at least a bit unique and important regarding the young driver’s way to reach the full time WTCC seat. In this article we’re trying to summarize the main details of the cars and guide you through Michelisz’s SEAT Leon fleet.

Driving the World Champion car – SEAT Leon TDI

SEAT became the first ever manufacturer to win a race with a diesel powered engine at the beginning of the 2008 season. The effectiveness of the technology generated long-standing controversy among the contenders but the diesel engine has remained allowed since its introduction and became a very successful construction. As of the start of the 2010 season, two world championships and 19 races have been won by the SEAT Sport factory drivers, including 2008 champion Yvan Muller and reigning champion Gabriele Tarquini.

Interestingly not the fastest SEAT Leon TDI is the most powerful racing car that SEAT has produced. The turbocharged engine produce 280 bhp at 4000 rpm which is less than the performance of the Supercopa but the other parts of the car were designed specifically for racing. Together with unique TDI engine, these bits make this car a competitive ride in the closely matched field of the FIA WTCC.

The technology used to be seriously protected with only the now dismantled works team and its former British arm having access for it. After winning the 2009 SEAT Leon EuroCup Norbert Michelisz became the first privateer driver to get the chance to race a SEAT Leon TDI on the FIA European Touring Car Cup in Braga 2009. Michelisz went on to win the first race of the cup with the completely unknown car and finished third overall after some difficulties with the tyre choice on the second race.

For the 2010 season SEAT newly-orientated its motorsport program, this allowed two selected privateer teams, SUNRED Engineering (including SR-Sport) and Zengő Dension Team to run the latest, 2009 specification Leon TDI racecars in the FIA World Touring Car Championship. This is the first time that a Hungarian operation gets the chance to use a current world champion technology on the highest level of circuit racing, so 2010 brings a unique chance for both Zengő Dension Team and Norbert Michelisz to show what they’re up to.

To give an impression of the WTCC – SEAT Leon FSI

Originally the SEAT Leon FSI was supposed to be used as a base for the works team of SEAT Sport but after the introduction of the TDI specification the FSI become a ’side-project’ for the factory and the developments were transferred to privateer teams. During the previous years, usually three petrol-powered Leons were used by Independent drivers; one of them was a guest car for the actual winner of a SEAT Leon EuroCup weekend-winner.

This is how Norbert Michelisz got the chance to drive the guest Leon that was then ran by SUNRED Engineering in Okayama 2008 and Brands Hatch 2009. Both races brought surprise results, as Michelisz’s teammate, the experienced Tom Coronel won the rain hit second race in Japan against the more competitive TDI cars and in Brands Hatch Michelisz broke into the top 10 in qualifying.

From the outside the car looks almost identical to its top class sister, the TDI, only the different front spoiler reveal that the car is actually powered by a petrol engine. One must not forget the sound: while the TDI is a surprisingly silent car, the petrol-engined car produces a ‘natural’ racing roar.

The key difference is obviously the totally different characteristics of the engine, which is officially less powerful than the TDI by 20 bhp. To give the FSI drivers a chance to be reasonably competitive, the minimal weight of their car is allowed to be 20 kg less than the TDI but since the introduction of the turbodiesel engine, the FSI has become a car to make the initial steps for privateer drivers and a competitive racecar in national touring car series.

Where everything started – SEAT Leon Supercopa

It might not be exaggerated to state that the second generation of the SEAT Leon Supercopa has a significant importance in the development of the Hungarian circuit-racing heritage, as this car formed the bridge towards the European market for the local talents in Hungary. Introduced in 2006 with the aim of producing a car with features that are as similar as possible to those of the cars participating in the WTCC. Spain and Germany immediately adopted the new car as a base of their national single-brand championships while Great Britain and – thanks to the efforts of Zengő Motorsport, Porsche Hungária and Hungarian Autosport Federation (MNASZ) – Hungary joined a year later.

The specification of the cars running in national championships are usually compatible with the regulations used by the factory-supported SEAT Leon EuroCup, a support series of the FIA WTCC that creates a bridge between the drivers running in local championships and the World Touring Car Championship. In other words, Norbert Michelisz and Zengő Motorsport have been able to compete in three different championships a year with a single car and gain the right to step into the WTCC twice.

This unprecedented possibility comes with trust that the drivers who are able to win with these cars are actually qualified to drive WTCC machines as well. This is because the 2 litre turbocharged petrol engine used in the Supercopa is more powerful than the WTCC engines, but in order to restrict the costs, the factory used numerous stock parts and less developed solutions that might slow it down a bit but still keeps the Supercopa not much behind the performance of world class Leons in the WTCC.