Tom Coronel believes it is “very difficult, if not impossible” to race in this weekend’s French round of the World Touring Car Championship after his big crash at the start of race one in Morocco.
Coronel suffered one of the biggest crashes of his racing career at the start of race two in Morocco on Sunday. The Dutchman, starting from pole position, was contacted by rival and friend Mehdi Bennani, pitching him into the walls on both sides of the track as well as being collected by Citroën’s Yvan Muller.
Coronel lays the blame for the incident with Moroccan Bennani, saying that once his car began to slide towards the wall there was nothing he could do to control the incident.
“The car is ‘bannani’. This definitely isn’t good,” said Coronel. “It started with a little tap, which isn’t a problem, but he kept pushing and started turning to the right. There was nothing I could do, I was merely a passenger in my own car. I don’t really understand it. Mehdi is a friend of mine and I reckon he was determined to shine here in front of his home crowd, but he definitely overdid it.”
Coronel explains that with significant damage to his brand-new RML Chevrolet Cruze he does not expect to be able to make the following round in France, with a lack of spare parts for the new machines the main issue.
“The damage to the car is massive. I don’t remember ever having had so much damage on a race car,” added Coronel. “Together with the ROAL Motorsport people, we took a good look at it and the bodyshell turned out to be damaged. These are not on stock, so it will be very difficult, of not impossible, to race next week.
“The car will be in Barcelona on Wednesday, but then we already have to leave to France to make it to the next race. However, to repair it, we have to be in England and there are no bodyshells in stock there. It really looks bad.”
Coronel has not completely ruled out racing in France, but remains realistic of his chances. “These technicians have done some more jobs that were considered to be impossible,” added Coronel. “It doesn’t look good, but we will wait and see what happens.”