Johan Kristoffersson: “The SEATs were just controlling us”

2012 STCC champion Johan Kristoffersson has said he’s disappointed with the pace of the Volkswagen Golf GTI TCR this weekend compared to the Cupra TCRs of PWR Racing, indicating the SEAT Dealer Team were limiting their pace in order to avoid further compensation weight changes.

The Cupra TCRs were handed an additional 20kg before qualifying after a recalculation of the STCC minimum weights which take into account the last few races, with it deemed the qualifying times from Robert Dahlgren at Mantorp Park shouldn’t be counted due to red flag conditions which prevented him from setting a competitive time.

“I really expected the Golf to be a lot stronger compared to the SEATs,” said Kristoffersson to TouringCarTimes. “We were nowhere compared to them on Friday, and in Race 1, they’re not stupid, they were just controlling us, just going as fast as they have to.

“Haglöf pulled away quite strongly, and then he realised he didn’t have to drive so fast. They controlled the first race, and then I tried to follow Dahlgren in the second race, and when he passed Ekblom it took me two laps to do the same, and it was also the same story again. He tried to catch Wernersson and then he realised the gap was too big and from then-on he was just controlling his tyres until the end and made sure to make the gap smaller to make the results look a little bit better.”