Lada drivers cautious after early teething problems

LADA Sport Lukoil go into their second full season since their WTCC return this year with the all-new Granta Sport. Drivers James Thompson, Rob Huff and Mikhail Kozlovskiy know the car has potential despite the lack of testing ahead of the new season.

The team has completed limited running at their Magny-Cours base ahead of the 2014 season. The team adds Rob Huff to their fold and will be targeting strong results, although they will face stiff competition from the 13 other cars built to the new regulations this season.

“After the 2014-spec Granta’s first shakedown in mid-March, the team struggled with some early teething problems that are an inevitability when building a brand new car,” said James Thompson. “The entire team has worked tirelessly and, having completed so few testing miles, it’s still too early to have an accurate impression of the car’s competitiveness. What I can say is that the car is significantly faster than the old model, although it can be faster still and we are working on it.

“The braking is markedly different to the previous year, as the aero is now a powerful tool. Of course, it remains to be seen whether or not LADA Sport Lukoil has an advantage – some of the team’s chief competitors have very aggressive aero packages – but, maybe the car’s relatively small dimensions will help in terms of top speed.”

New driver Rob Huff is happy with the stability of the new car, but knows the team will be behind its rivals at the start due to the stark differences in pre-season testing mileage.

“It’s difficult to ignore the lack of testing,” said Huff. “However, we can already be certain about some things with the new Granta. The car feels fast, the balance feels good, the brakes are working well, the engine feels very strong and you can really feel the aerodynamics working on the car. The car is much faster and more aggressive than the old-spec touring car and the LADA Sport Lukoil team has done a great job.”

Mikhail Kozlovskiy, heading into his second season in the Championship, recognises that Lada are unaware where they’ll fit in this weekend against the field. The team has tested in isolation at Magny-Cours, missing the joint Valencia test three weeks’ ago with Citroën, RML and Honda.

“We can judge the pace of the new Granta Sport only in comparison with the previous version, because we didn’t share the circuit with other teams during the pre-season tests”, he said. “The car has more power, has improved dynamic abilities and the aerodynamics are much better due to a reduction in height and an increase in width. The car’s balance is also better due to significant suspension improvements and the weight of the car was reduced by using more carbon fibre parts.”

The young Russian is fully aware that keeping the car intact for the following weekend at the Paul Ricard circuit is paramount. The Lada team had a disastrous start last season at Monza, where both cars were destroyed when former driver Aleksei Dudukalo ran into James Thompson’s car in the first part of qualifying. The team was forced to withdraw from the weekend and rebuild the cars for the second round at Marrakech, a feat which would have been impossible if the next round was just four days after. The incident saw Dudukalo leave the team, and with Kozlovskiy rewarded with the drive for the team for the remainder of the season.

“I would like to thank all of the LADA Sport Lukoil team for the job it has done,” added Kozlovskiy. “The first half of the season is going to be very tough. Only one week after Morocco’s event, we will have an FIA WTCC round in France. It means the drivers have much responsibility to preserve the cars in Morocco, bringing them to the finish, as we say, ‘in one piece’, because there will be no time to correct serious mistakes and repair heavy damage.”