Although Frédéric Vervisch was pleased to win the reverse-grid race of the FIA WTCR in France, the Audi driver wasn’t getting carried away with his pace, admitting ‘we should be fast because we are the lightest car on the grid’.
Vervisch claimed a lights-to-flag win in the opening race of the day at Pau-Arnos, having secured the reverse-grid pole when he posted the tenth fastest lap on Saturday.
But the Comtoyou Racing driver, who was in fact the first driver in 2021 to claim more than one win, admitted that he should have been able to make the most of the opportunity presented to him, given that his Audi is 20 kg lighter than the CUPRAs and 50 kg lighter than the rest of the field this weekend.
He also put his win down to the fact that he got a reasonable start, compared to rival Thed Björk and the fact that the circuit was a difficult one to overtake on.
“Obviously, it was a victory, so that’s great,” said Vervisch. “We had a great starting point on pole position, but I don’t know how it was for Yvan [Muller, in race two] but it’s not so easy.
“My start was not great, Thed had a better start but I could stay in front which was the key point. Then it’s quite hard to overtake clean.
“Our car was good enough to stay in front, we made a big gap after the restart from the safety car and then we could keep more or less the same gap. So great work from the team.
“But we should be that fast because we are the lightest car on the grid.”
In race two Vervisch claimed fourth, having started from tenth, making some opportunistic moves and also having to fend off contact from the likes of Esteban Guerrieri.
“Then for race two, again it was a very good race from my point of view. I started P10, and could finish P4.
“Our car seemed strong, especially our weak point is the front tyres at the end of the race, but we seemed quite good there.
“I’m very happy with the result and hopefully we can be a bit quicker in qualifying which is really important and then we can say [for sure].”
Vervisch has moved up to fourth overall in the drivers’ standings, 29 points from series leader Yann Ehrlacher.