All at stake in penultimate round at Adria International Raceway
The FIA World Touring Car Cup will host its penultimate round of 2021 at the newly rebuilt Adria International Raceway in Italy this weekend as a very close season nears its end.
Defending champion Yann Ehrlacher of Lynk & Co team Cyan Racing heads the standings, as he has since the fourth round in Hungary, with a margin of 16 points to Hyundai’s Jean-Karl Vernay.
While many drivers are still in mathematical contention for the title, it looks more like we will have four drivers from four manufacturers in the final duel.
Honda driver Esteban Guerrieri has climbed to third, 22 points from Ehrlacher, while Audi driver Frédéric Vervisch is fourth, 29 points behind.
Just as in the previous two rounds at Most and Pau Arnos, Adria means new grounds for the WTCR field.
The WTCC raced at the circuit during its first year after the rebirth of the championship in 2005, but the layout has since then been changed.
The WTCR was supposed to host a round there last year, but the the race weekend was delayed twice due to delayed construction works.
The new layout measures 3.745 kilometres with plenty of hairpins that could provide a lot of action.
Comtoyou Racing driver Vervisch scored the most points of all during the previous round and will for this weekend run with 20kg less and a lowered ride height of 10mmm thanks to recent BoP and compensation weight changes.
Points leader Ehrlacher will also benefit from weight reduction, having 10kg of compensation weight removed from his Lynk & Co 03 TCR and needs to bounce back after a tough previous race weekend where all of the Swedish/Chinese cars seemed to struggle with the starts.
“This is the first time I will race at Adria but I think we will be strong here,” said Ehrlacher.
“We have to be on the absolute edge as always and deliver in each session. We’re heading the standings but there are many drivers that can challenge us in the remaining races. My main focus is to win races this weekend and I can’t wait to get going.”
Münnich Motorsport driver Guerrieri also had to fight hard to remain with the top drivers at Pau Arnos and is not expecting an easy weekend in Italy either.
“I’m ready for another big battle at Adria, but we’re not expecting it to be easy,” said Guerrieri.
“I’ve been doing the rain dance for the past week so it would be nice to see a wet track. The car will still be heavy this weekend due to the compensation weight and that won’t help us having to pull through the slow corners, of which there are quite a lot. But that’s the way it is and we’ve managed to keep in the fight so far, so I will be trying my best again this weekend to stay there.”
Engstler Motorsport driver Vernay scored a win at Pau Arnos and is aiming to be back on the podium this weekend.
“It is another new track for everybody so we don’t have a clear idea of how the race is going to pan out and whether we are going to have some overtaking opportunities around this circuit,” said Vernay.
“Once again, qualifying is going to be very important and we need to continue the same work we did in Pau-Arnos. I felt really comfortable with the Hyundai Elantra N TCR in qualifying but also during the race, where tyre management was key. Let’s continue in the same way and we should have a strong event.”
While these four drivers are the main title contenders currently, things could quickly change as there are still 120 points left to be fought for in the remaining two race weekends.
2021 has so far produced ten winners in 12 races and it’s not impossible that we will see another two new winners this weekend.
Schedule – Adria International Raceway
November 6th
09:30 – FP1
12:30 – FP2
15:30 – Qualifying
November 7th
10:15 – Race 1 – 14 laps
12:15 – Race 2 – 17 laps
Times in CET
