Max Hart hopes for further FIA TCR World Tour outings

Independent Cupra driver Max Hart climbed to seventh place from 12th on the grid in the final FIA TCR World Tour race of the weekend in Macau and the Irishman hopes to return to the series next year.

“I’m still learning this car, which is a big factor,” Hart told TouringCarTimes.

“The team have given me a great car and they have done a fantastic job in everything, including the engineering side.

“We made some small changes from yesterday and they worked fantastically, I’m super impressed with the car.”

The SP Competition driver made progress in the initial stages of the race, despite a slow getaway from the grid.

“In the race I got a bad start, I’m still struggling to get this car off the line, but not too bad, just compared to my team-mate, who makes fantastic starts,” Hart explained

“The first lap in Macau is always hectic, you take more risks than what you should. I was able to pass one car into Turn 1 and then two cars in Turn 3 but, because I was on the outside, I had to concede, which is not the end of the world.”

Later, Hart worked with his team-mate Aurélien Comte to make progress.

“And then it was all about team work, Aurélien let me past and we worked together,” the SP Compètition driver added.

“I was able to bang in some good laps and try to attack the Hyundais but, ultimately, we didn’t have the pace on them, and I was happy with the lap times I got.”

The Irishman hopes his performance in Macau could lead to further opportunities in the series next year.

“If somebody would pay me I would go anywhere, of course, I’ve been trying to achieve this for a very long time,” said Hart.

“I think today I have shown I have the raw speed, so hopefully somebody will take notice that I had a good lap time and that the progress was really good.”