Motorland Aragón in Spain will host the penultimate round of the World Touring Car Cup (WTCR) this weekend. The venue will be making its début as part of the WTCR calendar, with circuit officials looking to boost its stature within the international car racing scene.
Motorcycle racing fans will already be familiar with the track however, as the Hermann Tilke-designed circuit has been a staple of the MotoGP schedule since 2010.
Earlier this month, Spaniard Alex Rins won on his home turf for Suzuki in the world’s premier bike racing championship, and his compatriot Mikel Azcona will be hoping to achieve similar feats in the WTCR.
During the previous two rounds in Slovakia and Hungary, Azcona has looked rapid in his Zengő Motorsport CUPRA. After a lack of testing, the team had endured a tough start to the year at Zolder and the Nürburgring. But over the course of the two Eastern European rounds, Azcona was one of the fastest drivers on track.
Despite that, the 24-year-old hasn’t quite had the results to match and is yet to take an outright victory this season; something which he’ll be hoping to put right at his home event.
Ahead of the weekend, Azcona seemed confident that his local track would provide plenty of entertainment for drivers and fans alike.
“It’s one of the tracks I know really good,” he said. “I started driving touring cars there in 2011 with the Renault Clio Cup so I know really good this track.
“It’s two hours from my house and when they said the WTCR would be going there I was very happy because it’s easy for my friends, family and sponsors to come.
“It’s a good venue with a good atmosphere. Because the track is so wide you can have a lot of overtakes, a lot of different lines. You can see a lot of battles, a lot of contact. It’s a MotoGP track but for the cars it will be really good also.”
Azcona may find that the pace of the new CUPRA Leon is slightly hampered this weekend though, with 10kg of compensation weight being added to it as a result of his fine form.
The hardest-penalised team however, is Münnich Motorsport. The German outfit will see an extra 30kg of success ballast added to their Honda fleet, taking each car’s total amount of compensation weight up to the maximum 60kg limit.
This comes after a brace of victories for championship contender Esteban Guerrieri, as well as a podium lock-out for the team in the final race of the previous round at the Hungaroring.
After a stunning performance by Guerrieri in Hungary, the gap to series leader Yann Ehrlacher has come down to just 22 points, with 25 available for a race victory.
In recent weeks, the Honda contingent have looked like the men to beat, while the early success of Cyan Racing’s driver quartet has seen their pace hamstrung by compensation measures.
Now though, the tide seems to be turning back in favour of the Swedish outfit, with their Lynk & Co 03 TCRs being given a 10kg weight break. Overall, this should provide Ehrlacher with a timely boost to fend off the hefty Hondas as the season nears its conclusion.
The car which has undergone the most extreme weight loss for this event though is the Audi RS3 LMS TCR. The cars which are run independently by Comtoyou Racing had been running 60kg of success ballast at the Hungaroring, but for the upcoming weekend that has been halved to 30kg.
Along with the Belgian team’s three regular drivers, Nicolas Baert will join them on the WTCR grid as a wildcard entry.
Baert, the son of the Comtoyou Racing team principal, will make his first appearance on the world stage after what has been a very strong début season in TCR Europe this year.
With just one round to go in that series, the 19-year-old is fourth in the drivers’ standings, with a race victory at Zolder to his name.
Another TCR Europe graduate making his WTCR bow this weekend is Josh Files. The reigning European champion will step into the Hyundai i30N raced by Nico Gruber last time out for Team Engstler.
Gruber had been drafted in to replace the otherwise-engaged Nicky Catsburg, but following his efforts at Petit Le Mans, Catsburg has tested positive for Covid-19.
Therefore unable to return to the WTCR paddock, the Dutchman’s misfortune has paved the way for Files to show what he’s made of at the top level of the sport.
Files had been scheduled to compete in TCR Asia this year for Solite Indigo Racing, but those plans were dashed by the onset of the worldwide pandemic. As such, Files has had to wait the best part of a year to make his return behind the wheel of a race car.
But, with the championship heading into its latter stages, the main focus will be on the title battle, which is shaping up to be a two-horse race between Ehrlacher and Guerrieri.
The pair’s respective team-mates Yvan Muller and Néstor Girolami are third and fourth in the championship, but they’re unlikely to do anything other than support the title push of their team leaders.
With the factory-backed Hyundai effort having fallen from grace somewhat this year, Alfa Romeo driver Jean-Karl Vernay is the next best-placed contender in fifth. But as an independent entry for Team Mulsanne, you could certainly question how credible his title chances truly are.
Although it may realistically be down to just two drivers, the championship battle should still provide plenty of intrigue. Neither Ehrlacher nor Guerrieri have won a WTCR title before, though the Argentine came tantalisingly close to doing so last year.
The regrets of 2019 have perhaps been evident in Guerrieri’s approach this time around. This season we have seen a particularly ruthless streak in the 35-year-old, having overthrown Girolami as Honda’s title focus in Slovakia.
That weekend, an overtake he made on his compatriot was put down to a ‘miscommunication’ regarding team orders, but in the following race he once again looked reluctant to concede position to his team-mate. In the end this would have weekend-ending consequences for Girolami who crashed out heavily after being made to defend from Vernay behind.
There to pick up the pieces – and a healthy tally of points in the process – Guerrieri walked away from the Slovakiaring as Honda’s best-placed driver in the standings at a crucial point in the calendar, thus setting himself up to go head-to-head with Ehrlacher.
The Frenchman meanwhile, has seemed much cooler throughout the year. Often, Ehrlacher has driven with a wise head on what are still relatively inexperienced shoulders.
At least part of that level-headed ethos may come down to having his uncle and four-time world champion Muller as his team-mate, with the 51-year-old being able to offer a wealth of experience that Ehrlacher wouldn’t otherwise have.
So, which approach will come out on top? The harmonious, collective team effort of Ehrlacher and Cyan Racing, or the more aggressive, daring style which Guerrieri has illustrated up to this point? We won’t know for sure until the season finale at Adria of course, but the image will become that bit clearer in Spain this weekend.