Citroën confirm drivers clear to race on Sunday

After a car saving exercise at the tricky Marrakech circuit last weekend in the first race of 2014, Citroën have confirmed all three drivers will be clear to race each other when they start first, secnd and third on the grid in the first race tomorrow at Circuit Paul Ricard.

“There’s no technical issue here, so yes,” said Team Principal Yves Matton to TouringCarTimes in regards to team orders. “In Marrakech the brakes were always a problem, we knew from Yvan (Muller), so we asked them to be sure to be at the finish, but here they will be able to play their best game,” he said.

The team have locked out the top three in qualifying, effectively for the first time after Muller’s original P2 time was disallowed last weekend. The closest car in qualifying to the Citroën Total WTCC team was Gabriele Tarquini’s Honda, but despite the strong result, the gap between Citroën and the rest of the field, most notably the Hondas and the RML-built Chevrolets, seems a lot closer this weekend.

In the second free practice session, the top Citroën was that of Muller, down in fifth position, which was expected given the use of old tyres by Citroën, but Matton admits he feels the other teams will close down the gap in the coming races.

“We did practice mainly with second-hand tyres, but the competition is closer,” added Matton. “At the moment we are using the six months advantage we built while we were working and they were not, but they will be closer race after race as they will develop the car and find a good set-up.”

Sébastien Loeb grabbed pole position at Paul Ricard in front of his home crowd, and drew level with Argentinian team-mate José María López in the points standings, while a loss of time in sector two kept four-time champion Yvan Muller off the front row despite his Q2 time being comparable to that of Loeb’s pole time.

“The feeling in the car is really good,” said Loeb. “I think we did a good job to find a good set-up in free practice. I tried really hard and of course we have pole position, I couldn’t really have expected much more before the start of the season.”

Team-mate Yvan Muller will again start third of the Citroëns, despite being the fastest driver for the team in FP2, Q1 and Q2.

“I was much happier with the car in Q1 and Q2, unfortunately qualifying should stop at Q2,” Muller remarked slyly. “I did a good lap in Q3, and to be honest I have to look at the telemetry to see where I lost it, as it felt quite good…my engineer told me I lost it in the second sector, but I don’t see where exactly.”

Looking ahead to tomorrow’s races, despite the reins being off between the Citroën drivers this weekend, he feels it’ll be difficult for the three team-mates to fight at the tough-to-pass circuit.

“I think the positions will probably not change after the first corner, as it will be hard to overtake because the time difference between us is so small, and it’s hard to pass on this track, but we never know, anything is possible.”