Alain Menu targeting title turnaround with Sonoma pole

Chevrolet’s Alain Menu stormed to his first pole position since April at Sonoma Raceway, at a circuit he and the majority of the field has never raced at before, and is hoping for luck to fall his way on race day.

Menu’s first run was in Q2 was the fastest of the three Chevrolet drivers, but Gabriele Tarquini’s first flying lap was even faster, dropping the three Chevrolets to second to fourth. On their second run, Menu was the only driver able to improve his time, and went quicker than Tarquini to claim pole position #2 of 2012.

“The key on this track was to do a good lap without a mistake, and I did that,” said Menu to TouringCarTimes. “The first lap of Q2 was also a good lap, but then I was told on the in-lap that Tarquini was two-tenths faster, so we all knew that we had to go quite a bit faster. It worked out, the car was good, but tomorrow is another day.”

“It will be tough tomorrow, we are very heavy compared to the SEAT and the BMW, and this track will be hard on tyres if the weather is like this,” said Menu, referring to the 34 degree heat at the track.

“I need to win a race and for Yvan (Muller) to hit some bad luck,” said Menu frankly. “I need to catch up soon, I don’t want to go to Macau with a 35 point deficit. So I don’t have much to lose now, so if I want to win the championship I need to win this race.”

“I’ve had some back luck, like in Slovakia with Stefano D’Aste when we touched each other on the third corner of race two when he never saw me. If that hadn’t happened I’d have finished in second place and that’s 18 points. So I’ve just been a little bit unlucky; not as bad as the last two years, the pace is there, with my guys and Albert (Lau) my new engineer we’re doing a good job, we have a new impetus this year and it shows.”