Delahaye Racing top BTCS launch test

The Delahaye Racing team have set the pace at the launch event at Zolder for the 2011 Belgian Touring Car Series, with triple champion Frédéric Bouvy leading the Volvo S60 of Eric van de Poele and Vincent Radermecker.

Delahaye Racing have increased their commitment to the Belgian championship this year moving from one to three Renault Mégane Trophy cars in the Silhouette 1 class.

Their fiercest competition will come from Volvo S60 Racing, with their single Volvo S60 for former BTCC star and ADAC Procar champion Vincent Radermecker and former Formula 1 driver Eric van de Poele. The Volvo S60 was a regular race winner late last season, but Delahaye’s expanded field will give them more cars to deal with.

The Jaguar XF of Jérôme Thiry and Werner Moonens was at the track but had limited running. Also absent from the launch day were the two Kia Pro_Cee’ds due to be raced by British team Chad Racing.

Former Kia driver Koen Wauters familiarised himself with his new T3 Touring class Volkswagen Scirocco which he will share with Ronnie Latinne at WRT, with a number of the other T3 and T2 drivers also present at the test.

Delahaye Racing’s new charges got their first experience of the S1 class Méganes after competing in smaller engined S2 class Solution F cars last season.

The No.1 Mégane of Frédéric Bouvy & Christian Kelders set the best lap of 1:38.710, with the Volvo S60 of Vincent Radermecker & Eric van de Poele just over one second back with a 1:39.858 in the test session.

The first round of the 2011 BTCS season takes place on April 9th-10th sharing the Zolder circuit with the FIA GT1 World Championship.