Tom Coronel battled his way to a points finish in the main World Touring Car Championship race in Hungary, despite having started on the front row of the grid after a ‘surprise’ qualifying performance.
Coronel put his car on second on the grid for the main race after making it into Q3 for the second time in 2016. In putting his car in second, Coronel also equalled his best-ever qualifying result in the WTCC, having never secured a pole position to-date.
“This time, my proverbial moment of fame certainly was in qualifying,” said Coronel. “We still had one set of tyres left from the previous event and we made maximum use of it.
“From the first free practice session, I was right on the pace. At the end of first qualifying, I was eleventh and I actually wanted to save another set of tyres. In the end, however, I didn’t and with that set I ended up fourth and made it into Q3 for the second time this year, a real surprise.
“But the biggest surprise was yet to come, because in Q3, I managed to post the second-fastest time in spite of two mistakes. That made the entire team go ballistic, especially as it also brought me some more world championship points.”
Unfortunately for Coronel, that would prove to be the highlight of his weekend. From starting ninth in the reverse-grid opening race, Coronel made the wrong strategy choice in a rain-affected opening race, slipping out of the points along with championship leaders Citroën, who also made the wrong call.
“Prior to race one, everybody who knew something about it told us that the rain would stop sometime around one o’clock, so we opted for slicks as a result, like most of the top drivers,” explained Coronel. “Only the Volvo drivers made a different choice.
“However, the experts turned out to be wrong. It kept raining and there wasn’t much I could do on slicks. I went in for a tyre change, but my chances in the race were gone.”
The main race saw Coronel receive a couple of taps on the opening lap to knock him down to the middle of the top ten, from where the Dutchman enjoyed close battles for the remainder of the race on his way to seventh.
“In race two, once again in the rain, I had a great start, but in the first corner, Rob Huff ran into my car and [Mehdi] Bennani did likewise soon after that. Thus, I immediately lost a couple of places.
“Apart from that, I had a good race with some nice fights with various works drivers. I had an intense battle with Nicky Catsburg and I was surprised by his racing lines sometimes. I also had a fight with my former team-mate [Tom] Chilton and I tried to stay ahead of him to become the best-placed privateer. I only just missed out.
“Towards the end, [Norbert] Michelisz slid across the track with a broken suspension and that cost me another position in favour of Rob Huff.”
Coronel says he is now looking forward to drier conditions when the WTCC hits the brand-new racing facility in Marrakech in just under two weeks’ time.
“That is another circuit that suits the Chevrolet and I hope that we can do as well there as we did here. However, I could do without rain there. Then, better race results are absolutely within reach.”