Münnich Motorsport’s Gianni Morbidelli admits he is pleased with scoring points on his return to the World Touring Car Championship, after a mishap in practice hampered his weekend.
Italian Morbidelli had been showing encouraging signs of pace early on in the weekend, posting the ninth fastest time in first practice. However in second practice the two-time WTCC podium finisher made a mistake just moments after Gabriele Tarquini and crashed heavily into the Honda, forcing him to miss qualifying.
Whilst Tarquini was out for the weekend with damage to his car, Morbidelli’s Münnich Motorsport team worked hard to fix his new Chevrolet Cruze TC1 for raceday. There, Morbidelli set about scoring some points from the back of the grid for both races.
A technical problem in race one limited the 46-year-old’s progress. However in race two Morbidelli came into his own, climbing from 17th on the grid to reach the top ten after just five laps. Morbidelli went on to finish seventh, which later became sixth after local racer Mehdi Bennani was excluded.
“To clinch a top ten finish this afternoon was possibly the most I could achieve here in Marrakech,” admitted Morbidelli, who experienced his first WTCC race since 2006. “Street circuits are unforgiving, and losing the most of Saturday due to my practice accident with Gabriele Tarquini was quite a handicap here. On top of that, we were short on track time as we only managed to shake down the brand new cars on our way to Morocco in Portimão. Taking this into account, it was a relief to learn how dedicated the staff at Münnich Motorsport is. I want to make my best to repay them as soon as possible.”
Morbidelli later explained that in the second race he decided to race cautiously near the end, all too aware of the dangers of his brakes failing around the notoriously stop-start circuit.
“WTCC is a tough and demanding series: in spite of starting both races from the back of the grid, I somehow steered clear of all the tussles, but in race two a braking problem developed and worsened as time went by,” continued Morbidelli. “I’ll tell you: the very last thing I was trying to do was to add to the team work load before Paul Ricard–in a weeks time. Therefore trying to move past the Lada in the second half of race two wasn’t quite worth the risk and I decided to play it safe. Our day will come.”