It’s been a ‘fine’ year for the WTCC

It’s time for the low down on all the stewards decisions on the 2011 FIA World Touring Car Championship. Who coughed up the most in fines? Who’s seen the stewards the most? Who is the WTCC’s ‘bad boy’ and also the best behaved racer in the 2011 season?

Well, the FIA stewards have had a busy season that’s for sure. This year they’ve collected €35,300 in fines, although €69,800 was the total allocated, just under half of that total were suspended penalties (of which, none were needed to be implemented).

The biggest contributor this season was Proteam Racing and for one race Engstler driver Fabio Fabiani. The Italian driver picked up fines of €7,000 this season on his way to winning the Jay-Ten Trophy, €4,000 of which was from the Japanese round alone for ignoring the mechanical black flags and yellow flags in practice. The latter two transgressions ultimately saw him not allowed to take part in that event and wait until Shanghai to secure his trophy win.

The 37-year-old Italian also picked up the most visits to the stewards this year with 18, though eight of these decisions were just the application of requesting to start the race as he hadn’t made the 107% qualifying time in any of his appearances in the outdated and normally aspirated BMW 320si.

Fabio Fabiani was a regular visitor to the stewards in 2011

The next closest to Fabiani in terms of stewards visits was Fredy Barth with 13, though the majority of these were for technical issues or small transgressions (leaving the steering wheel off – an offence almost every driver committed in the first two meetings), and for being caught up in incidents of which only one was deemed to be the Swiss driver’s fault.

Mehdi Bennani also was involved in 12 stewards decisions, though despite the high number, he and Michel Nykjaer were the only two full time drivers to not be awarded a fine for any reason all year. Tom Coronel came so close to joining them, but reversing the wrong way round the track at the final round at Macau in free practice earned the Dutchman a €2,000 penalty at the last minute.

Chevrolet’s championship battling trio picked up a €2,000 fine each for an error by the team for not declaring their gear ratios at Zolder, an error none of the drivers were effectively responsible for, and so never paid a fine for their own errors this year.

Charles Ng, the Hong Kong driver that contested just the final three rounds was the closest to ‘bad boy’ Fabiani in the fine stakes, picking up a massive €5,000 fine at Suzuka for overtaking whilst the red flags were out. On a fine per race calculation, Ng was certainly the highest though. Pepe Oriola was the closest to Fabiani and Ng, the 17-year-old Spaniard collecting €4,350 of fines across the 2011 season.

With Bennani and Nykjaer the only full time drivers not punished with fines, in terms of total stewards visits the best record and most unique record was for Jo Merszei, who was never classified on any stewards decision, not even having to ask permission to start the race at Macau, despite qualifying in the normally aspirated BMW 320si. Though as Merszei only took part in one race, the best behaved drivers of the full year were Robert Dahlgren and Rob Huff.

Volvo driver Dahlgren and Chevrolet’s Championship runner-up Huff only featured on four stewards decisions in the 2011 season. Two of Dahlgren’s calls were procedural. He was outside 107% at Donington Park due to the rain plus had to request parc ferme neutralization at the same event after contact with Kristian Poulsen’s BMW in race one. Though crossing the white line in Japan and a drive through penalty for contact in Hungary means the best behaved driver of 2011 is Britain’s Rob Huff.

Rob Huff was the WTCC’s ‘best behaved’ driver in 2011

Huff’s only four features on the stewards’ documentation this year were for two procedural technical check requests by Chevrolet, the failing by the team to declare their ratios at Zolder, and a single reprimand for crossing the white line in free practice at Porto.

Chevrolet team-mate Alain Menu was close, with six stewards decisions in total, the extra two over Rob were for parc ferme neutralizations at Monza and Macau. The Chevrolet team’s ‘bad boy’ was Yvan Muller. The three-time champion picked up a suspended fine for ignoring yellow flags at Zolder, a suspended penalty for spinning out Alain Menu at Monza and another suspended penalty for contact with Rob Huff at Donington Park.

Pos – Driver – Team – Season Fine
1 – Fabio Fabiani – Proteam Racing – €7,000
2 – Charles Ng – Engstler Motorsport – €5,000
3 – Pepe Oriola – SUNRED Engineering – €4,350
4 – Alain Menu – Chevrolet – €2,000
5 – Rob Huff – Chevrolet – €2,000
6 – Tom Coronel – ROAL Motorsport – €2,000
7 – Yvan Muller – Chevrolet – €2,000
8 – Stefano D’Aste – Wiechers-Sport – €1,500
9 – Yukinori Taniguchi – Bamboo Engineering – €1,500
10 – Norbert Michelisz – Zengö Motorsport – €1,250

Pos – Driver – Team – Stewards’ Decisions
1 – Fabio Fabiani – Proteam Racing – 18
2 – Fredy Barth – SUNRED Engineering – 13
3 – Mehdi Bennani – Proteam Racing – 12
4 – Pepe Oriola – SUNRED Engineering – 11
5 – Aleksei Dudukalo – SUNRED Engineering – 10
6 – Darryl O’Young – Bamboo Engineering – 10
7 – Tiago Monteiro – SUNRED Engineering – 9
8 – Kristian Poulsen – Engstler Motorsport – 8
9 – Norbert Michelisz – Zengo Motorsport – 8
10 – Franz Engstler – Engstler Motorsport – 7

Note: Stewards’ decisions aren’t for at fault reasons alone. Technical queries by the teams, parc ferme exemption requests, permissions to race after failing to qualify and investigations where the driver is found not at fault are also included in this count.