Volvo Polestar Cyan Racing head to this weekend’s World Touring Car Championship season opener in France ‘well prepared’ for their return to the series, according to Thed Björk.
The waiting is finally over for the Swedish team, who will return full-time to the championship for the first time since 2011, and for the first-ever time with a multi-car operation.
For Björk, who once previously raced in the WTCC at Shanghai in 2013, the start of the new season is a special occasion.
“This is the start of a completely new era for me personally and for the entire team, something I have dreamt about for a long time,” said Björk, the reigning four-time STCC champion. “We are coming well prepared but at the same time coming to something completely new.
“The goal for this weekend is to collect as much data as possible to continue building our foundation for our journey towards the top.”
His team-mate Fredrik Ekblom has not made a WTCC appearance since 2007. Despite showing promising pace during the official WTCC tests in Vallelunga earlier in March, he is being cautious about the team’s début weekend with the S60.
“While the pre-season testing in Vallelunga showed promising pace, both me and Thed have been at this level of motorsport for so long that we know that it is too early to draw any conclusions,” said Ekblom. “It will be extremely interesting this weekend to see where we are compared to our competitors who have many years behind them in this championship, while we start with a clean sheet of paper.
“I am eager to get going and it will be a big moment for us all in the team to start this journey.”
Polestar’s Head of Motorsport Alexander Murdzevski Schedvin reiterated the point that the team are intending to use their first year as a learning year.
“Our purpose with this programme is to become World Champions,” said Schedvin. “But this year is about following a specific plan to learn, with high discipline required from the drivers, engineers and the entire team in order for the competitiveness not to take over.
“We have an exciting weekend ahead of us, the first of many, and Paul Ricard is an amazing site with a lot of history to start our new challenge on.”