Photo: TCR Media

Tom Coronel takes blame for incident at the start with Pepe Oriola

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Craft-Bamboo’s Pepe Oriola and Honda’s Tom Coronel made contact at the start of the second race at Spa-Francorchamps, Belgium. Both drivers were eliminated from the race by the contact, although the Spaniard tried to continue racing after the incident, which also involved pole sitter Maxime Potty’s Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR.

Coronel took full blame for the incident, accepting that being behind the Spaniard he should not have hit him, although he does acknowledge that the SEAT driver braked quite early.

“I hit him, so it’s my fault, it’s as simple as that”, said the Dutchman to TouringCarTimes. “It was a very short race, only 300 metres. I had a good start, and I never expected to hit Pepe. I think he braked early, I braked late and that was it.”

Coronel does not think he braked too late, as he says he would have been able to challenge at least for the podium, if not for the win.

“To be honest I checked the video and the driver next to me brakes at the same point, so I know I could have done the corner as he did. He’s been a little too cautious, but on the other hand it’s just my fault. I knew I could bring a trophy home and it was stupid to lose the chance like this, I took too much of a risk. For sure I would have been able to bring a trophy home, and seeing where (Rob) Huff ended up I think I could have fought for the win.”

Pepe Oriola says he can’t believe that such an experienced driver as Tom Coronel deprived him of the chance to score important points, as the Spaniard was hoping to bag points in spite of a difficult weekend.

“It’s incredible that a driver of such a stature as Tom Coronel, who came here with no championship pressures, put my hopes of a podium to an end. I was starting from second and I expected a lot from this race, especially after SEAT Sport worked so hard to fix my engine issues. After the accident I tried my best to finish the race, but the car couldn’t do more than that due to the big hit. The only positive I can take is that I’m still in the top six of the championship, I now have to take it race by race to continue scoring.”