Petr Fulín keen on continuing Alfa Romeo Giulietta TCR development

Petr Fulín just missed out on a top ten spot today in qualifying, finishing eleventh, although 1.3s off the pace. The Mulsanne Racing driver made good progress through the weekend, and at one stage it looked like he would be able to make it in the top ten and make use of the reversed grid.

Despite not managing to get in the top ten, the former ETCC champion is satisfied with the progress made on the new Alfa Romeo Giulietta TCR: “I think we did a very good job, because on Thursday when we arrived we were 2.8s off the pace, but step by step we improved the car,” said the Czech to TouringCarTimes. “I tried different solutions in qualifying as well. We would need some private testing instead of using the races as a test, but we are still improving steadily.”

Fulín went on to explain the main issues still plaguing the Italian car: “We are down on power due to the lower engine capacity (1750 instead of 2000), and we tried to make up for that by using the turbo, but sometimes it is too violent. The corners with a wide radius are particularly tricky, because the Giulietta will power understeer and that’s one of the big issues.”

The driver enjoys the challenge and would be happy to continue with Mulsanne Racing: “I agreed to take part in this project, I like it because it is a challenge as this is a very new programme. Hopefully I will be able to continue, I think I will be in Sochi and then we will see what happens for the flyaways. It is up to the team really. Of course I am fully committed to the ETCC with Krenek Motorsport, but I really enjoy working and we are trying to get on top of the issues we have. We need to be patient.”

The pace shown so far is still leaving the Czech with a smile on his face: “At the beginning of the weekend I was really disappointed to be so far off the pace, but now it looks like we are eight tenths off the second row, and this is encouraging. If only we could have more testing I think we could grow more quickly.”

Fulín is yet to score any points in the championship.