Rob Huff to start 16th after broken suspension part in qualifying

Lada Sport Rosneft’s Rob Huff will have his work cut out for him on race day after qualifying 16th for both of tomorrow’s races when a suspension component failed shortly into qualifying.

The 2012 champion will start mired behind the mid-field for both races on Sunday in the Lada Vesta, which had already been struggling for pace at the swooping Paul Ricard circuit, carrying an additional 20kg of compensation weight as penance for their recent increase in lap performance.

“It’s the same as what happened to Jaap (van Lagen) in Moscow, I just hit the brakes at Turn 1 and then the bottom of the hub carrier broke,” said Huff to TouringCarTimes.

“After the test at Budapest when we had the problem with the front upright adapter, we strengthened them all, which we can do as it’s a free part, but now on the rear we appear to have found another weak spot. One (breakage) you can accept, but two you can’t, so we’re just going to have to look at strengthing it.”

With van Lagen qualifying ninth and Nicky Catsburg 12th, Lada weren’t showing the same form as they did in Moscow and Slovakia in France, but with the top ten reversed for race two, the prospect of a good points result particularly in race two was quite high.

“From the get-go yesterday it looked like we were struggling this weekend, so we weren’t going to be in the top five like we have been in the last two events, but the top ten was available,” said Huff.

“Last year I went from 15th to fifth in the wet, so if it rains again overnight that’d be fantastic, but I’m pretty sure in the south of France at the end of June it’s not going to rain.”