Santiago Urrutia insists that the most important thing for him is ‘to win for Cyan Racing’ after he moved to the top of the FIA World Touring Car Cup standings with victory in race two at the Hungaroring.
Urrutia effectively started the race from pole position after Rob Huff, the fastest driver in qualifying, was unable to assume his grid position after he failed to make it out of the pitlane in time.
That left the Uruguayan with a clear run to the first corner, and Urrutia seized the initiative, leading the race from lights-to-flag to notch up a second WTCR win.
With team-mate Yann Ehrlacher initially crossing the finish line in fifth, it looked as if Urrutia and Ehrlacher would share the championship lead leaving Hungary, although Néstor Girolami was later handed a penalty demoting him from second to fifth and thus promoting Ehrlacher, who now tops the standings.
Urrutia had expressed his confidence going into the weekend, and admitted that a mistake he had made in the last event had meant he had prompted him to re-evaluate his approach during the summer break.
“It’s a personal thing that when you are competing at such a high level of drivers and teams in the championship you can’t do mistakes, you have to be 100% every weekend,” said Urrutia.
“When I did a mistake in Aragón that cost me a lot of points in the championship and put me out of Q2, in the summer break I just worked. I worked for myself, I did a few things and I kept believing in myself.
“I said at the beginning of the weekend that I felt I could do well, I like the track, and everything started in qualifying which put me on the front row.
“In race one I brought the car home with good points in P7. I was a little bit lucky that Rob didn’t start race two, I started basically on pole.
“I had a good start and we know at this track when you are leading the pack it is much easier than when you are behind because you lose a lot of downforce. What can I say? I’m super-happy.”
Urrutia stressed the importance in a strong team result for Cyan Racing Lynk & Co, as he now sits just two points behind reigning champion Ehrlacher.
“It is the most important thing to win for Cyan, we are Cyan drivers. We follow rules and we’ll do our best.
“Of course, at the moment I am [second] in the championship, but we need to focus on the team’s championship in which we are in a good position.
“Thed [Björk] is coming back very well, he is doing a really good job in Aragón and here, so I’m super-happy for him.
“We’ve only done four race weekends, there are still another four race weekends, so we need to keep the pace, keep what we have right now.
“We’ve seen Audi is really quick, Honda even with 60 kg they can still be on the podium, so that’s pretty impressive.
“The only car we didn’t see as very quick this weekend was Hyundai, but the field is very tight, it’s hard to make a gap in the race, in qualifying, even in the championship.
“I think the guy who manages to be a little bit lucky and finish in the points at every race is going to arrive at the end of the championship with chances to win.
“If we keep going in this way, it will be fine.”