Starting issues spoil Mat’o Homola’s WTCC debut weekend

After a strong comeback in qualifying, Slovakia’s Mat’o Homola had it all to do again in both races at his home track yesterday after failing to get away at the start in both races. The first bad start was by his own admission his fault, the other was an unknown technical issue, which meant the 20-year-old ended up crossing the line last in both races.

Homola had qualified the car 11th, the third best placed of the seven Chevrolet RML drivers at the race despite having no time to work on the car set-up due to issues with the brakes all weekend.

“I had done two practice starts before the races and they went well, but in race one I forgot to do one step, which was my fault, I know. We then had some problems with the splitter, so I came into the pits and they repaired it and I finished the race.

“In race two, we had the same problem at the start even though this time I did everything correctly (for the starting procedure). The engine switched off, I don’t know the reason now, we need to look at the data. I was closing the gap to (John) Filippi and (Grégoire) Demoustier. It was a nice race, I had a little bit of understeer, but to be in this society of great drivers is really nice and I would like to thank all the fans, sponsors, Francois Ribeiro, the Campos guys and RML. They helped me to be here as a home hero.”