Photo: TCR Series

Mixed results for Team WRT in Oschersleben qualifying

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All three of Team WRT’s Volkswagen Golfs made the top ten in qualifying at Oschersleben, but all the drivers had different degrees of satisfaction with their results, all believing pole position was achievable, after it went to the rival Volkswagen of Gianni Morbidelli.

Jaap van Lagen was the best-placed of the team’s drivers on his second outing with the team, driving the brand new car which will be used in TCR Benelux next weekend at Zolder, qualifying in second behind Morbidelli by two-tenths of a second.

“I got a call last week from Leopard WRT, so it was a late call, but I’d like to thank Volkswagen, Leopard and WRT for this opportunity as I’m very happy with this result,” said van Lagen.

“The car was very good, I made a mistake in the last corner, or otherwise I could have fought for pole position.”

The #3 Golf GTI TCR of Rob Huff will line-up fourth on the grid for the first race, with the Briton still suffering with the same technical issues which plagued him in Hungary.

“We’ve still got some problems with the electrics, particularly with the gear shifting,” said Huff to TouringCarTimes. “We made four changes to the car ahead of Q2 which definitely improved it, but when I drove out the pit lane we had a vibration on the car, but my radio didn’t work, so I couldn’t call in to my engineer and see if we had another set of tyres, so I just had to go with it.

“I was only a tenth off Jaap, but without the vibration we could definitely have fought for pole position.”

Title challenger Jean-Karl Vernay was less pleased with his qualifying, setting the ninth best time, which will put him second on the grid for Race 2 at least, but one spot ahead of the fast-starting Honda of Roberto Colciago.

“It’s disappointing, but I don’t know what happened,” said Vernay to TouringCarTimes. “The cars of my friends were pretty good, but I had no traction at all and massive wheel spin. As soon as I was on throttle there was no traction.

“I’m happy because I’m at least P2 for Race 2, but it’s normally my job to be up front. Even my team-mates are much faster than me, but I’m usually up the top and last year I was also quick here. The car’s currently in parc ferme, but we’ll take it apart tonight and try and work on it.”