Andrea Belicchi expects Honda to dominate in China

Target Competition’s Andrea Belicchi came third in both Free Practice sessions earlier today.

The SEAT driver is not optimistic about the León Racer’s chances to knock the Honda cars off the lead, as the Italian feels the Civic TCRs have a straight line speed advantage.

“I think the Honda cars will dominate this weekend,” said Belicchi. “They seem to have much more speed on the straights and I think they haven’t shown all today.”

The Italian thinks the León Racer is almost up to its limit, and the room for improvement is way too small to catch the Hondas.

“We are quite OK with our car, we only need to fine-tune the set-up, but I think we cannot fill the speed gap.”

Having raced at Shanghai in the FIA World Endurance Championship, Belicchi already knows the track, but the speed, downforce and grip differences between the two types of car mean his experience has not proved as important as he would have liked:” I have raced here often with the WEC, but it’s almost like being on a different track: except for the lines, everything else, like cornering speed and braking points are completely different, and previous experience doesn’t give much advantage.”

Belicchi currently sits fifth in the championship, 16 points shy of championship leader and Target Competition team-mate Stefano Comini.