Photo: WTCC Media

Monteiro happy with car and performance in qualifying

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Tiago Monteiro is the top qualifying SUNRED driver for both races tomorrow, qualifying fifth for race one and provisionally on pole position for race two, but the Portuguese driver is looking forward to more power from SUNRED’s new 1.6 in the next few races.

Monteiro and Gabriele Tarquini were the only two SEAT drivers to make it into Q2, with Tarquini making some errors or his first few runs and ended up out of position to get a tow on his final lap, which saw him qualify tenth on the grid.

Monteiro on the other hand managed to get a good tow from his team-mate and qualify fifth, where he will start behind the three Chevrolet Cruzes of RML and Norbert Michelisz’s Zengö Motorsport BMW 320 TC.

“P5 was a good lap, it was a clean lap no mistakes,” said Monteiro to TouringCarTimes.

“Apart from the last corner where he (Tarquini) went a little wide and I had to go inside, but all the rest was a good tow, good drive and good car. The car was really nice to drive. Okay it’s lacking a bit of power, but if you don’t compare it to Chevrolet directly, you don’t notice the power.”

Monteiro will provisionally start from pole position for race two after setting the tenth fastest time in the first qualifying session, where the top ten are reversed.

Three weeks ago, Gabriele Tarquini started from pole for race two and managed to fend off both Rob Huff and then Alain Menu for the first non-Chevrolet win of the season, but Monteiro believes that’ll be much harder to achieve at Monza.

“I would have preferred to be in Zolder in this position, and not here. Because here, if you have the speed and the power you can be behind whoever and should be able to overtake with the tow, but I’ll fight of course.”

All the SUNRED drivers are still competing with the SEAT TDI engine, with the engine due to be introduced here, but this will now be put back until at least the next round at Hungary.

“We need it as fast as possible as we’re definitely losing time, we’re losing points and losing experience, “said Monteiro.

“When you see how the car is behaving – the chassis is still very good, and imagine with a little less weight and a bit more power, it wouldn’t hurt for sure.”