Chevrolet chasing first Belgian win

Chevrolet go to Zolder chasing their first WTCC win in Belgium, whilst two new BMWs and two new Chevrolet Cruzes are added to make up the 21 car field.

Zolder will be hosting only its second WTCC event this weekend. Originally not on the 2011 calendar, this meeting is standing in for the postponed Argentinean round which was to be held at Buenos Aires.

Last year at Zolder, SEAT locked out the front-row, and Jordi Gené passed Gabriele Tarquini at the start and went on to take what would have been his first victory in two years in the first race, but the Spaniard was later disqualified after irregularities were found on his turbo restrictor, giving the win to Tarquini.

This weekend, a repeat front-row for SEAT is highly unlikely with the León still running with the TDI engine, waiting for their new turbo unit which is set to debut at the new round at Hungary in June.

The SEAT TDI, still waiting for its 1.6 turbo engine

Drivers Tarquini, Tiago Monteiro, Pepe Oriola, Michel Nykjaer, Fredy Barth and Aleksei Dudukalo will have to do their best to just gather points as they wait, but the latter four will likely dominate the Jay-Ten category whilst other cars switch to the new 1.6 turbo engine, leaving Proteam’s Fabio Fabiani as their only competitor.

The most likely suspects for overall victory will be the RML Chevrolet Cruzes of Yvan Muller, Rob Huff and Alain Menu, which showed defiant pace at the opening meeting at Curitiba.

“Zolder is a one off kind of circuit and which has some mystique,” said Yvan Muller.

“I think we can do well there, but it will be essential to do well in qualifying, because starting from the front rows is a real advantage there. I don’t know what to expect from the competition, it will be interesting to see how much they have progressed since.”

“The competition is going to step-up in Zolder and it’s going to be challenging to keep the 1-2-3 in the championship that we built in Curitiba,” said Rob Huff.

“I am leading the drivers’ standings for the first time, it’s a nice feeling, but it doesn’t mean much at this stage, so I’ll be taking each weekend as it comes and try to do my best every time.”

The championship winning team will also face some additional competition this weekend.

The highly rated Hungarian team Zengö Motorsport arrive at Zolder with their RBM prepared BMW 320 TC for Norbert Michelisz. The 2010 Rookie Champion is tipped to be able to challenge for the independents’ title, despite missing the first round in Brazil, though will need to adapt quickly to the rear-wheel drive BMW to be a threat, and to be able to keep up the leading BMW of Tom Coronel.

The ROAL Motorsport BMW 320 TC of Tom Coronel, the best chance of a non-Chevrolet win?

Urs Sonderegger is the third competitor from last year’s SEAT Eurocup to join the grid after Pepe Oriola and Aleksei Dudukalo, but after a one race wait, the Swiss driver will join with a turbocharged BMW 320 TC for the German Wiechers-Sport team.

Zolder will see five Cruzes on the grid. Brazilian star Cacá Bueno won’t be taking part this time, the multiple Brazilian Stock Car champion is only running a partial season for RML, but nor will Bamboo Engineering’s Lacettis. The Silverstone-based team will instead be running a pair of brand new Chevrolet Cruze 1.6Ts for Darryl O’Young and Yukinori Taniguchi, which is likely to put Darryl back up front after a points gathering only appearance in Brazil.

Robert Dahlgren’s Polestar Racing Volvo C30

There are no local drivers taking part this year. Last year, Exagon Engineering wheeled out their older SEAT León TFSI for Pierre-Yves Corthals, and Chevrolet ran a guest car for Vincent Radermecker, but such opportunities aren’t possible with the lack of availability of 1.6 turbo engines this season.

The support schedule has taken a slight hit, with Jordi Gené’s new European Production Series having to drop its opening event this weekend and will now start at Monza. This leaves Legends and the Belcar sportscar series as the supporting categories this weekend, though the Belcar entry list will more than make up for the lack of Belgians in the WTCC.

Entry List

No – Driver – Nat – Team – Car
1 – Yvan Muller – FRA – Chevrolet – Chevrolet Cruze 1.6T
2 – Rob Huff – GBR – Chevrolet – Chevrolet Cruze 1.6T
3 – Gabriele Tarquini – ITA – Lukoil-SUNRED – SEAT León TDI
4 – Aleksei Dudukalo*^ – RUS – Lukoil-SUNRED – SEAT León TDI
5 – Norbert Michelisz* – HUN – Zengö Motorsport – BMW 320 TC
7 – Fredy Barth*^ – SUI – SUNRED Engineering – SEAT León TDI
8 – Alain Menu – SUI – Chevrolet – Chevrolet Cruze 1.6T
9 – Darryl O’Young* – HKG – Bamboo Engineering – Chevrolet Cruze 1.6T
10 – Yukinori Taniguchi* – JPN – Bamboo Engineering – Chevrolet Cruze 1.6T
11 – Kristian Poulsen* – DEN – Liqui Moly Team Engstler – BMW 320 TC
12 – Franz Engstler* – GER – Liqui Moly Team Engster – BMW 320 TC
15 – Tom Coronel – NED – ROAL Motorsport – BMW 320 TC
17 – Michel Nykjaer*^ – NED – SUNRED Engineering – SEAT León TDI
18 – Tiago Monteiro – POR – SUNRED Engineering – SEAT León TDI
20 – Javier Villa* – SPN – Proteam Racing – BMW 320 TC
21 – Fabio Fabiani*^ – ITA – Proteam Racing – BMW 320si
25 – Mehdi Bennani* – MOR – Proteam Racing – BMW 320 TC
30 – Robert Dahlgren – SWE – Polestar Racing – Volvo C30
35 – Urs Sonderegger* – SUI – Wiechers-Sport – BMW 320 TC
65 – Marchy Lee* – HKG – DeTeam KK Motorsport – BMW 320 TC
74 – Pepe Oriola*^ – SPN – SUNRED Engineering – SEAT León TDI

* Drivers eligible for the Yokohama Independents’ Trophy
^ Drivers eligible for the Jay-Ten Trophy (2010 WTCC specification)