New FIA World Touring Car Cup points leader Néstor Girolami admits that his weekend at the Hungaroring ‘couldn’t have been better’ after the Honda driver bagged two wins and a pole position to move to the top of the table.
Münnich Motorsport were the form team during the weekend, with Girolami setting the early pace on Friday before team-mate Esteban Guerrieri continued topping the times in second practice.
Girolami then claimed a first WTCR pole on Saturday, which he duly converted into a maiden win later in the afternoon.
Sunday promised to be a different prospect, as a Honda failed to top the times in qualifying, but Girolami benefitted from a hectic second race to move into the lead from sixth on the grid and he went on to double up on his win tally.
The Argentine driver then finished sixth in race three, meaning he leaves Hungary at the top of the drivers’ standings with a ten-point advantage over his team-mate.
“It’s been a fantastic weekend, even if Esteban couldn’t finish the third race – I am sorry for him,” said Girolami to TouringCars.Net. “But we have had a really good weekend, we have scored a lot of points and we are first and second in the championship; it couldn’t be better.
“Of course, if Esteban had finished the third race we would be in a different order, but still first and second in the championship, so I think we handled the situation to score a lot of points this weekend.
“We’ve scored 100 points in two rounds and this means a lot, because we are averaging 50 points per weekend. Our target was 35 points, and we are over 50 points ahead of this target, so I hope to keep this in the next event in Slovakia.”
Girolami added that he ‘got lucky’ to win race two, admitting that he doesn’t feel that he fully understands the Honda Civic like his team-mate does, having only competed in six races with the car.
“I didn’t know the car and I still don’t know, because there’s a lot of things to learn. Even today, when I made a mistake in qualifying, I was trying to find the limit and sometimes the car reacts differently and I need to understand why as it cost me a lot of points.
“In the end we handled the situation and we got lucky to win the race, but it could have been a better qualifying for me.”
The 29-year-old is not thinking about the championship, preferring to focus on continuing to cooperate with team-mate Guerrieri for the best possible team result.
“It’s so early to speak about fighting for the championship, but it’s a good way to start the season. We know each other really well, we know what we want, and we are willing to work together every weekend.
“If we have the opportunity to fight for the championship in the last two events then OK, we will try to fight in a good way, but it’s a long, long way to think about that.
“We are really good friends and we know what with respect we can race each other without doing something wrong.”