Polestar Cyan Racing has maintained a double World Championship lead following a chaotic WTCC weekend on the extremely challenging Macau street circuit, with Thed Björk leading the drivers’ championship by 6,5 points ahead of the season finale in Qatar.
Despite a major disadvantage compared to his competitors of never having raced in Macau, Thed Björk did not put a wheel wrong all weekend and claimed two top five finishes to keep his lead over main title rival and Honda driver Norbert Michelisz who has raced at Macau five times before.
”This race weekend was the most difficult of my life in terms of making no mistakes and keeping the pace needed strategically. While I always race for victories, I must say that I am pleased with the outcome and above all to accomplish our goal of leading the championship ahead of the season finale. We are no doubt in for an extremely exciting last race weekend of 2017,” said Thed Björk.
Team-mates Nicky Catsburg and Néstor Girolami had a challenging weekend in Macau with crashes during qualifying. But both managed to get back to score points in the races with the Dutchman finishing ninth in the first race and the Argentinian repeating that position in the second race.
”I am not happy with the result for me personally, but I am happy to see Thed keeping the championship lead. I had too many issues this weekend and I am more or less out of the title fight, so it is all about assisting Thed in the season finale and together claim the manufacturers’ title,” said Nicky Catsburg.
”It has been a tough weekend and I am very grateful to the team who managed to get my car back in perfect condition for the races after my crash in qualifying. Starting far back in both races meant difficult conditions to try and make up ground on this very narrow track. My ambition is to be back in strong form for Qatar to fight for a double World Title for the team,” said Néstor Girolami.
Polestar Cyan Racing keeps the manufacturers’ points lead ahead of main rivals Honda by 12,5 points going into the final race weekend of 2017; the WTCC Race of Qatar.
”Following qualifying we knew that we were going to have a tough fight and the points we scored were just about what we could expect. We are heading to the last race of the year in the lead of both championships to a circuit where we had a strong result last year. Our goal is of course none other but to secure a double World Title,” said Alexander Murdzevski Schedvin, Head of Motorsport at Polestar.
The 2017 WTCC season finale takes place in Qatar on December 1st: wtcc.polestar.com
WTCC Race of Macau
Circuit: Circuito da Guia
Length: 6120 m
Lap record (WTCC): 2:27.009 (Huff)
Results
Race 1 – Top 5
1 Mehdi Bennani Citroën C-Elysée 5 laps
2 Tom Coronel Chevrolet Cruze +1.952
3 Ryo Michigami Honda Civic +3.265
4 Thed Björk Volvo S60 +3.627
5 Norbert Michelisz Honda Civic +4.577
…
9 Nicky Catsburg Volvo S60 +10.688
13 Néstor Girolami Volvo S60 +18.512
Race 2 – Top 5
1 Rob Huff Citroën C-Elysée 13 laps
2 Norbert Michelisz Honda Civic +8.142
3 Tom Chilton Citroën C-Elysée +8.684
4 Esteban Guerrieri Honda Civic +9.228
5 Thed Björk Volvo S60 +21.237
…
9 Néstor Girolami Volvo S60 +34.326
13 Nicky Catsburg Volvo S60 +1:22.466
Championship Standings
Drivers’ – Top 5
1 Thed Björk Volvo S60 255,5 pts
2 Norbert Michelisz Honda Civic 249 (-6,5)
3 Mehdi Bennani Citroën C-Elysée 216 (-39,5)
4 Nicky Catsburg Volvo S60 211,5 (-44)
5 Tom Chilton Citroën C-Elysée 210,5 (-45)
…
9 Néstor Girolami Volvo S60 112 (-143,5)
Manufacturers’
1 Volvo 804,5 pts
2 Honda 792 (-12,5)
Compensation weights for Macau
Model – Time difference – Weight
Volvo S60 Polestar – 0.0 sec – +80 kg
Honda Civic – +0.1 sec – +70 kg
Chevrolet Cruze – +0.7 sec – +10 kg
Citroën C-Elysée – +0.8 sec – +0 kg
Lada Vesta – +1.0 sec – +0 kg
TV Schedule
https://www.fiawtcc.com/watch-it-on-tv
http://www.eurosportplayer.com
2017 FIA World Touring Car Championship Entry List
No – Driver – Team – Car
3 – Tom Chilton – GBR – Sébastien Loeb Racing – Citroën C-Elysée WTCC
5 – Norbert Michelisz – HUN – Honda Racing Team JAS – Honda Civic WTCC
8 – Aurélien Panis – FRA – Zengő Motorsport – Honda Civic WTCC
9 – Tom Coronel – NED – ROAL Motorsport – Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1
12 – Rob Huff – GBR – Münnich Motorsport – Citroën C-Elysée WTCC
18 – Tiago Monteiro – POR – Honda Racing Team JAS – Honda Civic WTCC
22 – Manuel Fernandes – POR – RC Motorsport – Lada Vesta WTCC
24 – Kevin Gleason – USA – RC Motorsport – Lada Vesta WTCC
25 – Mehdi Bennani – MOR – Sébastien Loeb Racing – Citroën C-Elysée WTCC
27 – John Filippi – FRA – Sébastien Loeb Racing – Citroën C-Elysée WTCC
34 – Ryo Michigami – Honda Racing Team JAS – Honda Civic WTCC
61 – Néstor Girolami – ARG – Polestar Cyan Racing – Volvo S60 TC1
62 – Thed Björk – SWE – Polestar Cyan Racing – Volvo S60 TC1
63 – Nicky Catsburg – NED – Polestar Cyan Racing – Volvo S60 TC1
68 – Yann Ehrlacher – FRA – RC Motorsport – Lada Vesta WTCC
86 – Esteban Guerrieri – ARG – Campos Racing – Chevrolet RML Cruze TC1
99 – Daniel Nagy – HUN – Zengő Motorsport – Honda Civic WTCC
FIA World Touring Car Championship 2017 Calendar
WTCC Race of Morocco (Marrakech): 7-9 April
WTCC Race of Italy (Monza): 28-30 April
WTCC Race of Hungary (Hungaroring): 12-14 May
WTCC Race of Germany (Nürburgring Nordschleife): 25-27 May
WTCC Race of Portugal (Vila Real): 23-25 June
WTCC Race of Argentina (Termas de Río Hondo): 15-16 July
WTCC Race of China (Shanghai Ningbo Circuit): 13-15 October
WTCC Race of Japan (Twin Ring Motegi): 27-29 October
WTCC Race of Macau (Circuit de Guia): 17-19 November
WTCC Race of Qatar (Losail International Circuit): 30 November-1 December
Contact Details
Duncan Forrester, Public Relations and Communications
Johan Meissner, Media Relations
Sunnie Zhang, Public Relations and Communications, China
John Paolo Canton, Public Relations and Communications, Americas
About Polestar
Polestar is Volvo Car Group’s performance road car brand. On 17 October 2017, Polestar became a new separately-branded electric performance car company, offering a portfolio of bespoke Polestar cars. Polestar will enjoy specific technological and engineering synergies with Volvo Cars and benefit from significant economies of scale as a result of its connection to Volvo. These synergies will allow it to design, develop and build world beating electrified high performance cars far faster than other new entrants into the market.
Polestar also builds the S60 and V60 Polestar, 367hp performance road cars with over 250 developments over-and-above the standard Volvo products through its Polestar Engineered offering. It also offers Polestar Engineered performance hardware upgrades and engine software optimisations for existing Volvo products.
About Cyan Racing
Founded in 1996 and today known as Cyan Racing, the privately owned and operated company has been Volvo Car Group’s official team in motorsport since its conception. Cyan Racing has claimed multiple titles with the Volvo 850, S40, C30 and S60. Today, the company enjoys success on track with the Polestar road car brand as Polestar Cyan Racing in pursuit of both the World Touring Car Championship and Swedish GT, racing the Volvo S60 Polestar road going performance car.
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Volvo Car Group en 2016
Au cours de l’exercice fiscal 2016, le résultat d’exploitation de Volvo Car Group a atteint 11 milliards de SEK (1,2 milliard d’euros), contre 6,6 milliards de SEK (697 millions d’euros) enregistrés en 2015. Le chiffre d’affaires pour cette période s’élève à 180,7 milliards de SEK (17,3 milliards d’euros), contre 164 milliards de SEK (17,3 milliards d’euros) en 2015. Sur l’ensemble de l’année 2016, les ventes mondiales ont atteint un record de 534 332 véhicules écoulés, soit une hausse de 6,2 % comparativement à 2015. Ces ventes historiques couplées à un résultat d’exploitation record particulièrement encourageant, incitent Volvo Car Group à poursuivre ses investissements vers sa transformation à l’échelle mondiale.
À propos de Volvo Car Group
Volvo existe depuis 1927. Aujourd’hui, Volvo est une des marques automobiles les plus connues et les plus respectées au monde, avec 534 332 véhicules vendus en 2016 dans une centaine de pays. Volvo Cars appartient à la société chinoise Zhejiang Geely Holding (Geely Holding) depuis 2010, et était rattaché jusqu’en 1999 au groupe suédois Volvo Group, lorsque la compagnie a été rachetée par l’américain Ford Motor Company. En 2010, Geely Holding a acquis Volvo Cars.
En décembre 2016, Volvo Cars comptait plus de 31 000 employés à travers le monde. Le siège social, le développement produit, le marketing et l’administration de Volvo Cars sont principalement situés à Göteborg, en Suède. Le siège de Volvo Cars en Chine se trouve à Shanghai. Ses principales usines de production de voitures se situent à Göteborg (Suède), Gand (Belgique), et Chengdu (Chine) ; les moteurs sont fabriqués à Skövde (Suède) et Zhangjiakou (Chine), et les éléments de carrosserie à Olofström (Suède).
