Hugo Valente says he is ‘delighted’ to have secured the first-ever pole position for LADA in the World Touring Car Championship, after the Frenchman was promoted to race one pole with Thed Björk’s exclusion.
Valente had originally qualified in 11th for both races, but the exclusion of the Polestar Volvo has left the new LADA signing with pole position for the reverse-grid race on his first weekend with the team.
Whilst it is not the first time that Valente has himself been on pole – he secured two reverse-grid poles in Japan and China in 2014 and three the previous season – it is the first for the Russian marque in the WTCC.
“I’m absolutely delighted to have secured the reversed grid pole position,” said a buoyant Valente. “Tomorrow’s races are going to be very interesting.
“This weekend has been harder than expected. I was somewhat off the pace in the wet and then slightly further in the dry and that’s also due to the unstable conditions we’ve had this weekend. If the weather was consistent, I would be able to use Nicky [Catsburg] and Gabriele [Tarquini] as a reference and learn from them, but there hasn’t been an opportunity for that.”
As well as pole for Sunday’s opening race, Valente was also part of the team effort which helped LADA to finish second in the first-ever MAC3 qualifying time trial between the manufacturers.
“Everybody got excited about MAC3 and it was a fantastic performance by LADA SPORT ROSNEFT,” added Valente. “My second lap was a 1m 29.9, whereas my best lap before that was a 1m 30.2, so it proves I have more speed and could have qualified seventh, which I was happy about. It makes me more confident going into the races, although I have no idea about our long-run pace”.
As well as a first-ever pole, even if it is on a reverse grid, Nicky Catsburg also gave the team reason to be optimistic about their pace when he made it through to Q3.
The Dutchman would get no further though, as he missed his chance to leave the pitlane on time and had to settle for fifth due to failing to post a time.
“Breaking into Q3 and ending up fifth is roughly where I expected to be at the end of qualifying, although fourth was achievable,” said Catsburg. “The LADA Vesta feels good and I don’t think we’re far away.
“There are still things that need to be improved with the car’s setup, though the changeable conditions we’ve had in qualifying made it difficult to find a reference and I think our performance relative to the other teams is a little unknown.
“I am delighted with what we did in MAC3. A lot of it comes down to the start and I was a little conservative – 0.030s too conservative, as it turned out – because I was wary of making contact with my teammates, so I’m confident we had what it takes to beat the Citroens!”