Photo: TCR Europe

Gianni Morbidelli aiming for podium after “tough” season

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WestCoast Racing’s Gianni Morbidelli is hopeful of securing a first TCR Europe series podium of the season at Barcelona this weekend, with the help of a reduced compensation weight for the Volkswagens.

Morbidelli finished the opening practice session third fastest, just over three-tenths of a second adrift of the pace-setting Audi RS 3 LMS of Comtoyou’s Gilles Magnus.

With both Audi (0kg) and Volkswagen (30kg) benefiting from significantly reduced compensation weight for this weekend, Morbidelli is confident he will be able to fight for a top three finish in the races.

“For sure, the target this weekend is to fight for a podium. We need to because since the start of the season, the performance has not been good enough,” Morbidelli told TouringCarTimes.

“We are happy to be near the top of the times, but I really did not have a good feeling with the handling of the car in that session, even if the performance is apparently good.”

Morbidelli was quick to point out that, while the Volkswagens received a weight loss ahead of the weekend, it has been a result of a difficult season which has failed to yield the expected performance from the team.

“The pace is good because we have a light car, but this is only the case because the performance has not been good. It’s been a tough year. We expected to achieve a lot more between myself and the team, who are really like a family.

“And also, we need to consider the fastest guys and not compare ourselves too much with them. They might have been using new tyres, we don’t know. So everything depends really.”

WestCoast Racing enjoyed a positive weekend at Barcelona in 2018, with Ash Sutton claiming a podium in the final race of the season.

But Morbidelli, while aiming for a similar result, believes he cannot read too much into last year’s performance ahead of this weekend.

“Last year, the team had a good result, but for sure this year is different. We cannot learn too much from what happened then as the car is very different this season. We hope to do the same this weekend as the car is fast.”