Yann Ehrlacher: Hungaroring pole and win more difficult than it looked

Cyan Racing’s Yann Ehrlacher claimed pole and victory in the TCR World Tour on Saturday, but said that his success around the Hungaroring was not as easy as it seemed.

Ehrlacher was fastest in qualifying by 0.143 seconds, and built a lead of 2.249s on the opening lap of Race 1. From there it was about managing the gap, which never dipped below 2.090s.

Most of that came down to looking after the tyres, which Ehrlacher explained to TouringCarTimes ended up being a key point in qualifying too, which was more difficult than it looked with rising track temperatures.

“We got a bit more used to the new tyre. Because in practice [to learn how] to save tyres, as we are quite limited, we didn’t put on a lot of new tyres. And with the wet [weather] as well, not a lot of dry running. So of course we were keep improving the car, improving the driving, getting more to the edge of the new tyre, that’s why I think the lap times were better and better.

“But the track was at a high temperature. It was not the optimum condition to record a good lap here. I mean we are quite pleased, we saw that the performance should be a bit slower than what we had in the past [with a different tyre supplier], a 1:51.6 in the previous years. Being six tenths off this I think is quite a reasonable lap to be honest.

“I’m happy about the pace we had, and about the work [the team] did: I mean it was not easy, to be honest it was a difficult qualifying for us.”

He added: “It’s difficult here to put a lap together. Like a single lock-up, then you lose two tenths. And then you lose two tenths in the corner, you lose at least one-and-a-half tenths through the lap because you f***ed the tyre. To put the lap on the edge here is very difficult.”

Although the air temperature remained stable during Saturday, the combination of hours of sunlight and hot rubber being laid down onto the track surface from the day’s action meant the track temperature continued to rise and would make the tyres vulnerable to overheating.

“I think we’re quite good in saving tyres, managing it,” Ehrlacher said ahead of the Race 1 start. “It’s the kind of track that end of sector one, sector two and beginning of sector three it’s difficult to follow cars being close. It’s always flowing corners. And if you are too close to each other, then the guy behind will [struggle].”

Starting from pole provided Ehrlacher with exactly the advantage he needed to aid tyre management, as after holding on to the lead on lap one he had clean air through the rest of the race.

“It’s P1. Four races, three podiums,” he said after victory, “We can be quite pleased about it. Hasn’t been easy, even if it looks like, but we had a good car to maintain the tyres to the end of the race.”

Ehrlacher’s aim for Race 2 is more “big points”, but says the team will “need to work” on some things first if they are to maximise starting from tenth on the reversed-grid.

Race 2 starts at 12:05 local time (CEST).