Photo: TCR Series

Alain Menu: “It’s a fantastic result” on his racing return at Zhejiang

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Alain Menu has said the results in China for Hyundai and himself were a fantastic result, especially as the Swiss driver has only competed in two races in the last two years.

The 54-year-old made his touring car return at Zhejiang, topping Free Practice 2 and the first part of qualifying, setting the best lap time of the weekend in the all-new Hyundai i30 N TCR.

Menu was involved in an incident with the Boutsen Ginion Honda of Aurélien Panis at the start of Race 1 and the Comtoyou Racing SEAT of Denis Dupont which earned him a drive-through, but he recovered to 11th, still just 20 seconds behind the race leader, his team-mate Gabriele Tarquini.

The team were quickly handed a heavy Balance of Performance adjustment of 40kg and an engine power adjustment, but Menu was able to work his way from 13th to fourth in the second race.

“It was a fantastic result for Hyundai and also for me,” said Menu to TouringCarTimes. “I’m disappointed with the drive-through for the incident at the start; I think I was just minding my own business.

“After the race, the team found that the tow link had come loose, so they did a good job to fix that between the two races, so in Race 2, even with the BoP change, my car felt better because of that problem in Race 1.

“My last race was in May last year, and before that was Brands Hatch in 2015, so I’ve not done much recently, so I’m very happy. I cannot be disappointed.”