Menu hoping to recover championship ground tomorrow

Alain Menu is hoping to close-in on his two Chevrolet team-mates in the points standings with finishes the goal on Sunday at Porto.

The Swiss-driver lines up on pole position for race one, after setting the lap record at the newly reconfigured Circuito da Boavista in the second qualifying session, but will start down in ninth place for race two after setting the second fastest time in the first part of qualifying, where the top ten are reversed.

“The plan was to do (2:0)6.8 I think it was, I was dead on target to do that but for some reason when I put the power down out of the very last corner I had so much grip that I did a (2:0)6.6,” said Menu to TouringCarTimes.

Menu’s not too concerned from the competition behind him if he gets a good start for race one, but will be mired in the middle of the pack for the second race of the day which starts unusually late at 16:50 BST/WEST.

“If I lead then I should win the race, and race two, I don’t know. I’m starting from ninth I think, I have to get some points. The problem for my Championship is Yvan hit me off in Monza and Coronel hitting me off in Budapest, which has cost me a minimum of 35 points so I would be looking pretty good, but now I’ve got some catching up to do.