Challenging STCC debut for Gabriele Tarquini

Gabriele Tarquini made his debut for Volvo Polestar Racing in the STCC at Karlskoga this weekend. The Italian had a tough couple of races right in the thick of the field.
“It has been an interesting weekend. The car worked well and I got in to the driving rather quickly,” said Tarquini to TouringCarTimes.

The 2009 WTCC champion had never driven at Karlskoga before the first test session in which he was 10th fastest. Qualifying saw Tarquini missing Q2 with just 0.071 seconds, claiming 12th on the grid.
“Starting 12th on a track like Karlskoga is not easy, the track is very narrow and short which makes overtaking difficult,” said Tarquini.

Tarquini finished 11th in the first race and 13th in the second race after being involved in incidents of both races.
“I got hit by a Honda in the first race which made the car a bit difficult to drive due to the damage. Then in the second race a BMW spun right in front of me which made me lose a lot of time,” said Tarquini.

The STCC weekend at Karlskoga was Tarquini’s first ever taste of the Volvo C30.
“The Volvo is a strong car, quite similar to what I have driven before. The engine characteristic of the atmospheric engine was a bit different as I have driven turbo engines for the past seasons. But overall it is a strong package and the pace in the race was really competitive,” said Tarquini.

Tarquini is going to take part in the coming STCC race at Jyllandsringen in Denmark as well, before returning to the WTCC with SUNRED Engineering for the remainder of this season.
“I have gained a lot of experience of the C30 that is going to be useful for the next race at Jyllandsringen, which I am looking forward to,” said Tarquini.