Tom Coronel described his battle with Rob Huff in the Main world Touring Car Championship race in Morocco as being ‘like in the old days’ after he held off the Brit to finish in eighth position.
For Coronel, the weekend turned out to be one of fortune as, after qualifying in 12th position and initially missing out on the reverse grid pole position, the ROAL Motorsport driver later found himself promoted up the grid when several drivers had their qualifying times disallowed.
The result saw Coronel move from 12th to tenth in the Q2 qualifying ranking, which in turn put him on pole position for the Opening Race after the grid reversal was taken into account.
In the end the Dutchman couldn’t hold on to the lead in race one, finishing in eighth after leading the early stages of the race. It was the brakes on his Chevrolet Cruze which let him down, as Coronel slid wide whilst leading in the first half of the race.
“It is good to be back on the grid with the trusted ROAL Motorsport team and in a field that includes many familiar drivers, but also plenty of new ones,” said Coronel. “I was a bit fortunate to be able to start the first race from pole position.
“The start went well, I took the lead, but the safety car was deployed one lap later after other drivers had collided. Racing resumed on lap five, but it was difficult for me to pull a gap.
“I had [Esteban] Guerrieri with his Cruze behind me and he, in turn, had the works’ drivers following him. My brakes started working less and less and the brake power was gone altogether halfway through the race.
“Fortunately, that happened at a point where it was possible and where there were no walls. I was able to continue without any damage, but lost yet another position to [Tom] Chilton. [It was] too bad, because we came really close to winning the race.”
Coronel was given a top-up of brake fluid from race one winners Campos Racing ahead of the Main Race, where he started from ninth on the grid, benefitting from a penalty for Münnich Motorsport’s Rob Huff, whose team had to fix his car outside of the allotted repair time.
In the end Huff caught Coronel, but the Brit couldn’t find a way past as the duo battled hard in the closing stages of the race.
“I went all-out in the battle with Rob Huff in the Citroën,” added Coronel. “We really fought for every inch, like in the old days.
“The braking worked well, but the handling of the car wasn’t excellent. Still, I was able to keep up and fight. That is what racing is all about.
“I also understood that we got the attention from the cameras and that is another reason why we are doing all this: to provide action and entertainment for the crowd.
“Now we still need to find our way to the podium and then we are where we want to be.”
Coronel’s busy season continues in two weeks’ time when he takes part in the TCR BeNeLux Series at Spa-Francorchamps, one week before the WTCC moves to Monza for the second meeting of the year.